But later, when the aspect began to change, when the figures I had created took form, when the howlings, the shrieks, the screams became music, when I ceased shuddering and quaking as the hours of rehearsal approached—my confidence came back. I even surprised myself listening with pleasure to my music, and distinctly remember having thought at least at three occasions:
"Patrick, my dear, you are a splendid fellow after all. You ought not to have been so much impressed by the first seemingly helpless trials of all these good people. How all has improved! There are few living composers, if any, able to conceive and to write such a score. And to think that the crowds will come and listen and applaud. But will they understand? Is the crowd sufficiently educated to appreciate my work? Do I not stain the beautiful conception of my fancy by submitting it to the crude judgment of the crowd? Still, a crowd it will be; they will come and listen and applaud. The theatre contains room for fifteen hundred people. There are about one hundred and fifty seats so bad that nobody will take them, but the remaining thirteen hundred and fifty will be occupied at every performance. Now, how many people will come and listen and applaud? Be modest, Patrick, old boy. Say twenty-five performances at an audience each of thirteen hundred and fifty. Makes?... makes?..."
I never knew, for I am bad at figures.
Altogether I was in high spirits, smiling like Sergeant Young before a battle. By the way, I do not know what has happened to Sergeant Young. He has seemed sulky since the other day, when he left me so abruptly. It pains me, for he is my particular chum. And save what is needed to carry on he does not utter a single word to me.
But I must not let myself go into a diversion; I was speaking not of Sergeant Young but of myself and of my high spirits. Yet you must not believe that I was happy. I have already stated that I was altogether happy only during our performance in front of Schubert. That sentiment of perfect felicity never came back. And now, during the rehearsals of Lady Macbeth I was bitten by that "green-eyed monster, which doth mock the meat it feeds on": jealousy.
As I am quoting Othello I may as well say that the Cassio in my case was the pretty Lieutenant Franz von Heidenbrunn. I suppose that you have seen it coming a long time ago, and I have only to record how the green-eyed monster was hatched. No Jago was necessary for me, nor was there any handkerchief required.
The regiment in which the pretty officer held his high rank had been shifted from Salzburg to Brünn. This was a coincidence, and you will see a very unfortunate one for me.
Every morning, when there was a rehearsal, I went from Vienna to Brünn by the eight o'clock train which makes the journey in a little over an hour. I used to meet Mitzi at the Viennese Northern Station, and we travelled together, which rendered that hour as short as it was delightful. Rehearsals in Austria as in Germany begin at ten, and last from three to four hours. Afterwards we had lunch and then we returned by one of the numerous afternoon trains to Vienna.
Perhaps you wonder why I did not prefer to take up my quarters altogether in Brünn. Well, first there was that double journey which I would have lost, as well as the always pleasant company of my fiancée. And in the second place there was Brünn.