Her tone, in repeating the same words she had used to Sorell, fell into the same pleading note.
He shook his head, almost with irritation.
“It was out of the instrument—out of improvisation—that all my composing grew. Do you remember the tale they tell of George Sand, how when she began a novel, she made a few dots and scratches on a sheet of paper, and as she played with them they ran into words, and then into sentences—that suggested ideas—and so, in half an hour, she had sketched a plot, and was ready to go to work? So it was with me. As I played, the ideas came. I am not one of your scientific musicians who can build up everything in vacuo. I must translate everything into sound—through my fingers. It was the same with Chopin.” He pointed to a life of Chopin that was lying open on the couch beside him.
“But you will do wonders with your left hand. And your right will perhaps improve. The doctors mayn’t know,” she pleaded, catching at straws. “Dear Otto—don’t despair!”
He flushed and smiled. His uninjured hand slipped back into hers again.
“I like you to call me Otto. How dear that was of you! May I call you Constance?”
She nodded. There was a sob in her throat that would not let her speak.
“I don’t despair—now,” he said, after a moment. “I did at first. I wanted to put an end to myself. But, of course, it was Sorell who saved me. If my mother had lived, she could not have done more.”
He turned away his face so that Constance should not see it. When he looked at her again, he was quite calm and smiling.
“Do you know who come to see me almost every day?”