Not everyone would find it possible to live happily in a Pullman car. But Paderewski had a happy combination of physical and mental gifts that made this life seem quite pleasant. He slept without any difficulty, putting worries aside and falling into a sound sleep as soon as he went to bed. His bedtime, to be sure, was rather erratic on concert nights. Whenever he played he worked himself up to such a frenzy of excitement that it took him hours to “unwind.” But he had two unfailing methods of relaxation—billiards and bridge. He was fiendishly expert at both.
Paderewski’s generosity—whether to whole audiences or to individuals—was boundless. Many railroad companies ran special Paderewski excursion trains from the country into the cities where he was playing. If one of these trains was delayed by bad weather, Paderewski would simply wait for its arrival or would add an extra hour of music at the end of the recital for the benefit of disappointed late-comers.
Hobos gathered around to listen.
As for his generosity to individuals—it was the despair of poor Goerlitz, who tried hard to set some limit to his employer’s open-handedness in money matters! There was no point at all, Goerlitz knew, in even trying to reason with him if the people asking his help were Polish. In such cases, he was hopeless. But the secretary often wished that he would not be quite so generous about matters that were strictly business. Like fees! There was that incident in California, for example....
A young engineering student named Herbert Hoover was working his way through Stanford University by a variety of methods. First he organized a laundry pick-up and delivery service. Then, with another student for a partner, he opened a lecture and concert bureau. The amateur managers had not done well with their last attraction—a speech by William Jennings Bryan—and they hoped to recoup with their big spring attraction, Paderewski. But the concert business is filled with pitfalls for the unwary, as the young men were about to learn. Paderewski’s fee was high for those days—$2,000. Therefore the price of the tickets was high—higher than the residents of San Jose and environs were used to paying. The managers had also failed to notice that the date selected for their concert was in Holy Week, which cut down attendance still further. Their Paderewski concert turned out to be an artistic triumph—but a financial disaster. When the last word was in from the box office, the poor impresarios found themselves somewhat short of their expenses. It was a solemn moment.
The two students held a hasty conference. The first obligation, of course, was to pay the artist. The local people to whom they owed money for the rental of the hall, the advertising, the printing, and all the rest, would probably accept i.o.u.’s until they could find a way to pay their debts. Fortunately for the two students, word of this leaked out to Paderewski. He took quite a different view of the situation.
“Add up all the expenses of presenting this concert, down to the last penny,” he told the young men. “Then subtract it from the box office receipts. Whatever you have left is enough for me.”
“But Mr. Paderewski—that will leave you $400 short of your fee! Let us give you a note and pay it back as soon as—”
“No, no, no.” He waved aside the suggestion good-naturedly. “It is enough. After all, if I did not earn my fee for you, why should you pay it to me?”