At the height of his promise, in consequence, it was said by some, of a certain mental shock, the young composer had fallen victim to a rare, insidious disease, arising apparently from an organic derangement, small in itself but deadly in its secondary effects. The chief characteristics of this malady were a general muscular prostration growing ever more profound, and a slowly increasing feebleness of vital action. It was an illness for which medical science had provided no cure; the physicians could prescribe only such drugs as arsenic and strychnia, to postpone as long as possible the climax of that fatal debility. The patient was already afflicted with an immense exhaustion, incapacitated from any but the slightest of muscular efforts, unable to carry on the simplest occupation. Yet despite his almost continuous attacks of headache he could think—of the collapse of his hopes, of the approaching end.
In the beginning David Verne had rebelled against this fate with all the force of one who feels that he is in the world for an unparalleled purpose—who refuses to believe that any physical affliction is meant to thwart the unfoldment of his genius. All the splendid raptures pressing toward expression, the conviction of unique capacity and great prolificness, reinforced his determination to be well again. Brantome declared that in those early days it had been like the combat of a hero against malefic gods—a "sort of Greek tragedy."
"Well," said Brantome, in a tone of stifled fury, glaring at Lilla with his eyes of an old conquered Viking, "have you seen these pigmies brandishing their fists at thunderbolts?"
Disqualified long ago from walking, to-day David Verne could hardly raise his hands to lay them limply upon the keyboard of a piano.
His mind had suffered as sad a deterioration as his body. Formerly fine, as befitted the source of fine achievements, it was now deformed by bitterness. The last of those bright qualities, which in other days had endeared him to his friends, were dying now, or perhaps were already dead, In fact, Brantome confessed, it was doubly painful to receive him here; one had to see the wreck not only of a young physique, but also of an invaluable spirit.
Lilla sat frozen. At last she uttered:
"Ah! this world of ours!"
And she had a vision of a universal monster evolving exquisite forms of beauty only to destroy them fiendishly.
"Yes," Brantome assented. He, too, for all his experience with life, looking crushed anew. Indeed, in his old countenance there was a look of defeat as dismal as though the ruin of that young man's hopes had involved one more precious aspiration of his own. After a pause he exclaimed, "I haven't suggested that you, who have enough unhappy recollections, meet the poor fellow——"
"What was the shock that caused it?"