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Title: The Music Master
       Novelized from the Play


Author: Charles Klein



Release Date: November 24, 2007  [eBook #23603]

Language: English

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THE MUSIC MASTER

by

CHARLES KLEIN

Novelized from the
Play as Produced by
David Belasco

Illustrated with Scenes
from the Photoplay
A William Fox Production







[Frontispiece: "MY LITTLE GIRL HAD JUST SUCH A DOLL--IS IT POSSIBLE
THAT YOU--?"]



New York
Grosset & Dunlap
Publishers

Copyright, 1909
By Dodd, Mead & Company
All rights reserved

Published, March, 1909




THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED

TO

David Warfield, Artist

BY THE AUTHOR




List of Illustrations


"My little girl had just such a doll--is it possible
  that you--?" . . . . . . . . . _Frontispiece_

The "music master" can no longer pay rent for the piano.

Anton Von Barwig is compelled to pawn his favourite violin.

Beverly brings Helene a wedding gift.

Anton learns that his newly found daughter is to be married.

Helene prepares her trousseau.

"I want you to come with us?"

Helene and Beverly find love's haven.




Chapter One

Anton Von Barwig rapped on the conductor's desk for silence and laid
down his baton.  The hundred men constituting the Leipsic Philharmonic
Orchestra stopped playing as if by magic, and those who looked up from
their music saw in their leader's face, for the first time in their
three years' experience under his direction, a pained expression of
helplessness.

"Either I can't hear you this morning, or the first violins are late in
attacking and the wood wind drags--drags--drags."

"What's the matter?  We've played this a hundred times," growled
Karlschmidt, the bass clarionet player, to Poons, the Dutch horn
soloist, who sat at the desk next to him.

Karlschmidt was a socialist, a student of Karl Marx, and took more
interest in communism than in his allotted share of the score of
Isolde's _Liebestodt_.  Indeed, nearly all the men were interested in
something other than the occupation which afforded them a living.  For
them the pleasure of music had died in the business of attaining
accuracy.

"What did he say?" asked Poons, losing Von Barwig's next remark in
trying to hear what Karlschmidt was mumbling.

"He said it's his own fault," whispered the second flute.

"He's quite right," assented Karlschmidt.

"Hush, hush!" came from one or two others.  Von Barwig was addressing
the men again, and they wanted to hear.

"Let's play; cut the speeches out," growled Karlschmidt.  "For God's
sake, what's he saying now?"

"Damn it!  How can we hear when you won't keep quiet?" blurted a
Germanised Englishman who had an engagement at the old Rathaus and
wanted to get away.

"We're dismissed," said Poons, who couldn't hear.  But the men at the
violin desks down front were rising and putting away their instruments,
and the others were slowly following their example.

Karlschmidt's face expanded into a smile; the prospect of avoiding the
unpleasant grind of rehearsal had restored him to good humour.  The
lines of men were now breaking up into knots; bows were being loosened,
violins put into cases and brass instruments into bags, while laughing
and chatting became general.  Poons looked at Von Barwig, who still
stood on the small dais, staring out into space, and he saw that
something was the matter.  He loved Von Barwig; for years before, when
hard times had sent him over the border from Amsterdam toward the
German music centres, Von Barwig had extended him a helping hand,
indeed had almost kept him from starving until he got an engagement in
one of the minor Dresden theatres; Poons was grateful; and gratitude is
a form of love that lies deeper than mere sympathy.

"Can I do something for you, Anton?" he asked a few moments later, as
he stood at the conductor's desk.  Von Barwig did not answer; and with
his round face, and smiling eyes glancing appealingly at his conductor,
Poons stood waiting like a little dog that patiently wags his tall in
hope of his master's recognition.  Presently he shook his head gravely
and sighed.  Surely something was wrong, for Anton was not himself.
Never before had he stopped rehearsal and dismissed his men on the
morning preceding a concert night, and, moreover, the night of the
first performance of a new symphony--Von Barwig's own work.

The men were rapidly disappearing, and the Gewandhaus concert platform
was almost empty.  Von Barwig seemed deeply interested in watching his
men carry off their instruments, and yet, when Poons looked closely
into his face, he knew that the leader did not see that which he was
apparently watching so closely.

"Shall I wait for you, Anton?" ventured Poons finally.  As if to remind
Von Barwig of his presence, he touched him gently on the arm.  Von
Barwig started.  A look of recognition came into his eye, and with it a
smile that metamorphosed his homely, almost ugly face into something
beyond mere beauty; a smile that transformed a somewhat commonplace
personality into an appealing and compelling individuality.  There is
no need to describe the delicate, sensitive, rugged countenance, which,
when he smiled, radiated love and sympathy for his fellow-beings and
made him what is ordinarily described as magnetic.

Poons caught this smile, and his own broad grin deepened as he
recognised his old friend again.

"Come, let's go," Von Barwig said briefly; and without another word
they walked out of the Gewandhaus.  They passed the statue of
Mendelssohn erected in front of the building, walking down the August
Platz as far as the University.  Poons noticed that unusual things were
happening that morning.  First, his friend was walking rapidly, so
rapidly that he himself almost had to trot to keep up with him; second,
he was muttering to himself, a most unusual thing for Von Barwig to do;
third, every now and then a look of intense hatred beclouded his face;
and last, he was not talking over the events of the morning with his
friend.  Furthermore, so engrossed was Von Barwig in his own thoughts
that he passed Schumann's monument without lifting his hat, and
Bismarck's monument without shaking his fist; and these two things Von
Barwig had done, day in and day out, ever since Poons had known him.
Finally, when at the Thomas Kirche Poons ventured to ask, "Where are we
going?" Von Barwig stopped short in the middle of the street he was
crossing.

"That's it, that's it!" he said excitedly; "where am I going?  Where am
I going?" and he looked at Poons as if he expected that his frightened
friend would answer his question.

Poons took his friend's arm and pushed him out of the road on to the
pavement just in time to save him from being grazed by a cab which
rapidly whisked by them.  Then he stopped and laid his hand on Von
Barwig's shoulder.

"What's the matter, Anton?" he said soothingly.  "Can't you tell me?
In God's name, what has happened?"

Anton looked at Poons.  The unexpected had happened; his devoted
follower had dared to question him.  The shock almost awoke him to a
sense of his surroundings, and the ghost of his old smile stole over
his face as he shook his head slowly.

"That's it!" he gasped.  "I don't know!  I don't know!  It's the
uncertainty that is killing me.  By God, August, I'll kill him!  I'll
kill him!"  And then Poons understood.

They walked on in silence, whither neither of them knew.  It was now
Poons's turn to walk faster than his companion and to mutter to
himself.  His face had lost its grin, and he was no longer conscious of
his immediate surroundings.  After they had passed Auerbach's cellar he
could contain himself no longer, and an explosion took place.  He
stopped Von Barwig in the middle of the pavement, grabbing him by the
arm, and in a hoarse, gutteral voice, choked with emotion, shouted,
"Anton!  Anton!"

Von Barwig looked at his friend in mute surprise.  Poons, oblivious of
the bystanders--who were looking to see why a man should shout so
unnecessarily--went on:

"By God, Anton, I kill him, too!"

This appealed to Von Barwig's sense of humour, and he burst Into
laughter, a laughter perilously near to tears.  It never occurred to
him to ask Poons what he knew or what he had heard.  The fact that what
was preying on his mind, his carefully guarded secret, was common
property did not strike him at that moment.  He merely thought that his
friend was agreeing with him in the sentiment of killing "some one" as
he agreed with him in all matters of music, philosophy and art.  In
Anton Von Barwig's condition of mind at that moment, had it occurred to
him that Poons knew the awful fact that was confronting him, he would
have taken him by the throat and then and there compelled him to
confess what he knew or thought he knew; but he walked on in silence,
followed by his devoted friend.

They turned up a small side street of the August Platz and stopped in
front of the house where Anton Von Barwig lived.  It was the centre of
a row of large modern apartment houses where lived for the most part
the art world of Leipsic, and this world included beside the rich,
professional element, the wealthy publishers, of whom in this important
centre of Germany there were a large number.  As Von Barwig stood
waiting for Poons to enter with him, he noticed Poons's outstretched
hand.

"Aren't you coming in?" he asked.  Poons shook his head.

"I'd better not," he said simply.

"Why not?" asked Von Barwig.

"Because," Poons faltered.  He did not want to tell his friend that at
such times as these it is better for a man to be alone with his
thoughts.

"Why not?" cried Von Barwig; but Poons did not speak.  He stood like
some dumb animal awaiting his master's lash; and then Von Barwig knew
that Poons knew.

"Come!" said Von Barwig in a low, hard voice, with such firmness and
determination that Poons, in spite of himself, was compelled to go
forward.  Silently they walked up three flights, neither of them
noticing the salute of the porter as they passed him.  Anton took out
his keys and opened a door which led into a magnificently furnished
musical studio, the largest apartment in Koenigs Strasse.  It was here
that he and Madam Elene Von Barwig, his wife, held their musical
receptions and entertained the great German and foreign artists that
came to Leipsic.  These receptions were famous affairs, and invitations
were eagerly sought, not only by musical celebrities, but by such of
the nobility as happened to be in town.  Members of the royal family
had been known to grace more than one of these affairs; for though a
conductor of the Leipsic Philharmonic is not necessarily a rich man,
his social position is unquestioned.

Perhaps some such fleeting thoughts as these--glimpses into the past
like those of a drowning man--came into Anton Von Barwig's
consciousness as he stepped quietly to the door leading from the
reception-room and studio and passed into the corridor toward the
living apartments.  He listened intently; but hearing nothing, closed
the door quietly, and somewhat to Poons's alarm turned the key in the
lock.

"Now tell me," he demanded, in a voice that was as strange as it was
determined; "what do you know?  Sit down."  This last was a direct
command.

Poons felt that nothing was to be gained by silence.  He had, so to
speak, put his foot in it by allowing himself, through sympathy in his
friend's affairs, to betray the fact that he knew what was troubling
him.  He felt, therefore, that by making a clean breast of it, he might
not only mitigate Von Barwig's sufferings but enable him to see what
the world, or at least the world of Leipsic, had seen for some time.

Poons was not a rapid thinker, but these thoughts flashed through his
mind in less time than it took him to obey Von Barwig.  He sat down in
the chair indicated by his friend and tried to collect his thoughts.

"What do you know?" repeated Von Barwig.  Poons moistened his lips with
his tongue, as if to enable him to speak; but words would not come.  He
loved Anton; he knew that what he had to say would make him suffer; and
that he could not bear to see.  He tried to speak, faltered "I cannot,
I cannot!" and burst into tears.  Von Barwig walked up to the window
and gazed steadily into the street.

"It's more serious than I thought," he said after a few moments' pause,
giving Poons time to recover in some slight degree from his emotion.
"It is serious, eh?"

"Yes," assented Poons, relieved that Anton's question required only a
monosyllable for an answer.

"Very serious, eh?" asked Von Barwig, steeling himself for the answer
he expected.

"Yes, I think so," nodded Poons, gulping down a sob.

"The worst, eh?"

"God, you know what scandal-mongers are; what people say--when they do
say--how they talk!  They have no mercy, no brains, no sense!  What is
a woman's reputation to them?  They repeat, they--they--the
wretches--the murderers--"  Poons seemed to be trying to shift the
blame on a number of people; it was easier for him to generalise at
this moment than to answer his questioner straightforwardly.

"Do they say that my wife--that Madam Von Barwig neglects her home?"

"Yes."

"And her child?"

"No, no!" eagerly interrupted Poons, quite joyous at being able to deny
something at last.

"Do they say that she--neglects me, that she doesn't care for me,
that--" Von Barwig spoke now with an effort; "that she no longer loves
me?"

Poons nodded affirmatively.  He was summoning up all his courage for
the question that he knew was coming; and it came.

"Do they say, do they mention--his name?"

Poons again nodded affirmatively.

"Ahlmann?"

"Yes."

Von Barwig held his breath for a moment; then literally heaved a sigh.
What he most feared had indeed come upon him.  The world knew; his
heart was on his sleeve for daws to peck at.

"How long have you known this?"

Poons hung his head, he could not answer.  He was longing to throw his
arms around his friend's neck and cry on his shoulder; and he could
think of nothing to say but "Poor Anton!  Poor Anton!"

"Don't pity me, damn you! don't pity me!" burst out Von Barwig.  "And
don't sit there bleating like a lost sheep of Israel!  I'm not a
woman--tears are no panacea for suffering like mine.  Put the world
back five years, restore for me the past few months; then I could live
life over again, then I could see and know and act differently.  Don't
sit there like a wailing widow, moaning and moping over other people's
miseries!  That isn't sympathy, that's weakness!  If you want to help
me, tell me to be a man, to face my troubles like a man; don't cry like
a baby!"

"That's right," assented Poons, "go on; it does you good.  Give it to
me, I deserve it!"

"Poor old Poons, you do your best!  Ah, your love does me good, old
friend; but there's hell to face!  She threatens to leave me, to leave
me because I refused to allow him to come here.  I've warned him!  And
if he shows his face in Leipsic again, I'll kill him!  Look!"  Von
Barwig felt in his inner pocket.  "Now you can understand why I
couldn't hold the men together at rehearsal this morning.  My mind was
with her, with him.  Ha! the mother of my little girl, my little
Helene!  That's the pity of it, Poons, that's the pity of it!" and now
it was Von Barwig's turn to show weakness.  "That's what I can't
understand.  A woman's love for a man, yes, it can go here, there,
anywhere; but the mother instinct, how can that change?"

"Doesn't she love her little girl any more?" asked Poons in simple
astonishment.

"She loves _him_," said Anton.  "Can there be room for the mother love
with such love as he inspires?"

He looked at the letter in his hand and passed it to Poons.  "This
morning, just as I was leaving for rehearsal, the servant handed me
this.  My little girl is all I have left now."  His voice choked with
emotion as he turned once more toward the window.

At the sight of his friend's suffering Poons could no longer contain
himself, and he fairly blubbered as he read the following:


"DEAR ANTON: Henry Ahlmann is in Leipsic and I have seen him.  I cannot
live a lie, so I am going away with him.  Believe me, it is better so;
I feel that you can never forgive me and that we can never again be
happy together.  Kiss my darling Helene for me, and oh, Anton, don't
tell the little one her unhappy mother's miserable history until she is
old enough to understand!

"ELENE VON BARWIG."


"Well, that's conclusive, isn't it?" asked Von Barwig grimly as soon as
Poons finished reading.

Poons's voice failed him.  Hot, scalding tears were fairly raining down
his cheeks as the letter fell out of his trembling hands and fluttered
to the floor.

"Well, what's to be done; what's to be done?"

"Then she has gone?"

Von Barwig nodded.  "I suppose so!  I don't know, I can't tell," he
said helplessly.  "I didn't try to stop her," he went on after a pause.
"What's the use, to what end?  Oh, I don't want the entire blame to
rest on her shoulders!  A beautiful woman, twenty-five years of age, a
pampered, petted, spoiled child, craving constant excitement; and he, a
handsome, young American, rich and romantic.  I, as you know, am a
mature man of forty, devoted to an art in which she takes little
interest.  I introduced them.  Ha! that's the irony of it!  I brought
them together, I left them together, I--it's my fault, Poons--my fault!
I neglected her for my work.  With me, all was music: the compositions,
the rehearsal, the concert, the pupil, the conservatory, the opera, the
singer, the player.  He used to take her to my concerts; and I,--fool,
fool--encouraged him, for it gave me more time to devote to my art.  An
artist is a selfish dog!  He must be, or there is no art.  What could I
expect?  I am fifteen years older than she; ugly----"

"No, no!" blurted out Poons.

"Misshapen, undersized----"

"No, no!"

"My friend can lie, but my looking-glass doesn't.  I know, I know!
God, how will it all end?  How will it all end?"

At this point the door shook a little as though some one were trying to
get in.

"She's come back!" almost gasped Anton, and walking firmly to the door,
he unlocked and opened it.  As he did so, a little fairy creature
between three and four years of age, with golden, flaxen curls and blue
eyes, bounded into the room, calling out, "Papa!  Papa!  Where is oo?
Where is oo?"

Von Barwig was on his knees in a moment, and the child threw her left
arm around his neck and hugged him so tightly that the little doll she
held in her right hand was almost crushed between them.

"Helene, Helene! my poor, motherless little baby!"  And then for the
first time Von Barwig gave way to tears.

"We are alone, alone, alone!  Oh, God!  Oh, God!" he sobbed as he
rocked from side to side in his agony.  Poons crept softly out of the
room and closed the door gently after him.




Chapter Two

It was past seven o'clock that evening when Poons returned to Von
Barwig's apartment on his way to the Gewandhaus concert.  His old
overcoat buttoned tightly over his well-worn dress suit covered a
palpitating heart; for Poons was afraid.  A few minutes before, when he
had kissed his motherly wife good-bye and told her to take good, extra
good care of their little son August, she had noticed that his hand was
trembling.  And when he tried to account for his nervous condition by
reminding her that Anton Von Barwig's new symphony was to be played
that night and that a member of the Royal family was to be present on
the occasion, she had shaken her head gravely, accusing him of being a
foolish, timid old boy.  It needed all the courage he could muster up
to enable him to ring the door-bell of Von Barwig's dwelling.  There
was such a death-like stillness that Poons thought for a moment no one
was there; he dreaded he knew not what.  As he stood listening to the
silence, he thought he heard a child's laughter, and he sighed in
relief.  The servant came to the door, a sleepy-eyed German _maedchen_
as strong as an ox and nearly as stupid.  "Oh, it's Herr Poons," she
said.  "Come in.  I tell Herr Von Barwig----"

"Is he--is he?  _How_ is he?" faltered Poons, much relieved that the
girl showed no evidence of acquaintance with the real condition of her
master's mind.

"I tell him," repeated the girl stolidly, without answering his
question.

Closing the hall door, she ushered him into the studio and left him
standing there.  Poons looked at his watch; it was a quarter past
seven.  He still had fifteen minutes to spare before the concert
engagement, which began at eight o'clock, called him to the Gewandhaus.

While he was wondering what he could say to his friend, the servant
opened the door leading to the living apartments of the family and
intimated that he should come in.  Poons passed through a magnificently
furnished drawing-room and library, and thence into the dining-room.

"This way," said the girl, opening the dining-room door, beyond which
was a passage leading to the kitchen and bedrooms.  Poons looked
surprised, and the girl hastened to say:

"Herr Von Barwig is in the nursery."

"Ah, of course," nodded Poons, as he followed her.

Not very observant usually, Poons noticed that the dinner table was set
for two persons.  Both places were undisturbed and the food was
untouched.

"He has not eaten," thought Poons.  "Of course she is not here!  Oh,
God! that is the tragedy of it!  The empty chair, always the empty
chair--it is like death!"

As the nursery door opened Poons heard the sound of voices and laughter
and, to his utter astonishment, saw his friend Von Barwig on the floor
playing with little Helene's dolls' house.  Helene was shrieking with
childish laughter because Von Barwig pretended to be angry with one of
her dolls which would not eat the cake he tried to make it swallow.

As Von Barwig saw his friend, a look of intense pain crossed his face,
but he forced himself to smile and say:

"Come in, Herr Doctor Poons, and mend this little girl's eye.  See,
I've given her cake to eat, but it won't do her eye any good!"

Helene laughed gleefully at the idea of cake being good for a broken
eye.

"Good gracious, how did the eye fall out?" said Dr. Poons, shaking his
head gravely.

"She fell down and I kicked it," lisped the little one.  "I kicked it,"
she laughed, unconscious that she had committed an unprovoked assault
on her plaything.  "Mend it; oh, please mend it!"

Poons shook his head gravely.  The child mistook this for a confession
of his inability to do what she wished.

"Mamma 'll fix it when she comes home.  She won't be long, will she?"
said the child, somewhat tearfully.  She had asked the question many
times, and her father seemed unable to answer her.

"I am trying to make her forget," said Anton savagely to Poons, in
answer to his look of painful inquiry.  "She must forget soon; I've
been with her ever since you left me this morning."  His arm stole
around the child's neck, and drawing her to him gently, he kissed her
again and again with such sad, lingering tenderness that the ever-ready
tears welled up into Poons's eyes, and he turned his head to conceal
them.  The child struggled to free herself.

"Papa so rough, eh?  Well, he won't be, or Herr Poons will beat him,
eh?"

"Surely," assented Poons.

"Papa will be so gentle and so kind," went on Von Barwig tenderly.
"He'll love his little girl as no little girl in this wide, wide world
was ever loved before, eh?"

Little Helene did not understand, and as she had nothing at this
precise moment to occupy her attention, she answered him by asking the
one question that absorbed her mind, "Where's mamma?"

Von Barwig and Poons looked at each other helplessly.  Apart from the
tragedy of two men trying to comfort a little child that had lost its
parent, there remained in Von Barwig's mind a sense of the utter
inability of the masculine individuality to fill the place of mother in
the child's heart.  In after years, Von Barwig always remembered the
sinking sensation he felt when this fact came home to him in full force.

"Well, one thing," said Anton, as he swallowed something that came in
his throat and threatened to choke him, "one thing, she was kind to the
little one; the was a kind mother, eh?"

"Kind? kind?" began Poons fiercely.  "Is it kind to----"

Von Barwig silenced him with a look.

"Yes, she was a good mother," he admitted conciliatingly.  "But, by
God, if we don't go we shall be late!  Phew!" he whistled as he looked
at his watch, "half past seven."  Von Barwig sat still for a moment.

"Half past seven?  Yes."  Then, as if it were slowly dawning upon him
that he had duties, he arose, dusting his knees mechanically.

"Half past seven, yes.  It begins at eight, eh? and I must dress.  Yes,
I suppose I must dress!"

The little girl was now putting her dolls back into the dolls' house;
the doorway was blocked up and she was pushing one through a broken
window in the little house as Von Barwig caught her in his arms and
caressed her.

"How can I leave her?  Good God, how can I leave her?" he groaned.  He
stroked her face, her hair, and kissed her again and again.

"She's all I have, all; she's all I want.  I won't go to-night, I won't
leave her, do you hear?  Let Ruhlmeyer conduct to-night.  I can't go, I
can't leave her alone!  Suppose something were to happen to her?"

"But you must go!" said Poons firmly; desperation had given him
courage.  "You must go!"

Von Barwig looked at him in surprise; Poons's tone sobered him a little.

"For her sake you must work," went on Poons, gaining courage as he saw
that his words had an effect on his friend.

"Yes, I must work," assented Von Barwig, feeling the force of Poons's
words.  "Shall I go, little Helene, my little darling?  Shall I go?"

"Yes, go and tell mamma to come," was the little one's reply.

"Come, hurry, Anton!  You must dress, you have barely five minutes:
five to dress, ten to get to the Gewandhaus."

"Ha! they can wait!" said Von Barwig grimly.  "Prince Mecklenburg
Strelitz, the Kaiser, all Germany can wait, while I mend the strings of
my heart!"

The nurse-maid came in and suggested that it was time to put little
_Fraeulein_ to bed.  Poons looked at her closely; her eyelids were red,
for she had been crying.

"Take good care of the little _Fraeulein_," said Von Barwig as he handed
her over to the maid.  It was long past her bedtime, and the little
child had almost fallen asleep in her father's arms.

"Let me kiss her just once more; I won't wake her up!"

The girl burst into tears as Von Barwig bent over the child, kissing
her tenderly; then she hurried into the next room with her precious
charge.

"She knows?" inquired Poons.

"Yes," nodded Von Barwig; and then, with a sigh, "She knows."

Five minutes later, Von Barwig, accompanied by Poons, left the house
and hurriedly took a cab to the concert hall.




Chapter Three

It was noticed by more than one member of the Leipsic Philharmonic
Orchestra that Herr Director Von Barwig was in unusually high spirits
that evening.  Many attributed it to the fact that he was nervous because
of the first production of his new symphony.  Karlschmidt hinted to his
deskmate that Von Barwig was nervous and was trying to conceal it by
pretending to be delighted with everything and everybody.  This was
probably true in a measure; at all events, when he came into the artists'
room at the Gewandhaus at about five minutes to eight, he shook hands
with everybody, joked with his men, and talked almost incessantly, as if
he wanted to keep at high pressure.  Poons watched him closely.  Von
Barwig was unusually pale, and as he slapped his concert meister on the
back Poons noticed that, though his face wore a smile, his lips quivered.

"For heaven's sake," he heard him say to the leader of the second
violins, "don't play the _pizzicato_ in the third movement as if you were
picking up eggs!"  Poons rejoiced that his friend could forget so easily.

It was, however, when Von Barwig walked out on the platform to the dais,
bowed to the immense audience, and turned to his men, that the deadly
pallor of his face was most apparent.  Some of the audience noticed it as
he acknowledged the applause he received.  There was not a tremor of hand
or muscle, not an undecided movement; merely a deadly pallor of
countenance as if he no longer had blood in his veins, but ice.  The men
felt the absence of the compelling force that always emanated from him,
that seemed to ooze from his baton; that psychic something that compelled
the player to feel as his director felt--the force we call magnetism.
The firmness of mouth showed that the determination to dominate was still
there, but the absence of that mental power left only the automatic
rhythm and swing, sans heart, sans soul, sans feeling.  The beat was the
beat of the finely trained academic conductor, but the genius of it was
gone.  The ghost of a departed Von Barwig was beating time for the Von
Barwig that had lived and died that night.

Perhaps the audience did not feel this as much as the men did, for they
applauded heartily at the end of the opening number.  They did notice
that Von Barwig did not acknowledge their applause and seemed to be
oblivious of their presence.  The fact that an ultra-fashionable audience
was present, including a prince and princess of the Royal Family, and the
_elite_ of Leipsic, to say nothing of the American Ambassador, Mr.
Cruger, apparently did not affect Von Barwig in the least.  This appealed
very much to the democratic instinct of Mr. Cruger, and at the end of the
first part he asked his friend, Prince Holberg-Meckstein, to present him
to the conductor.

"I will present him to _you_," said his highness, carefully readjusting
the pronouns; and he sent for Von Barwig.

"A curious personality!" remarked Mr. Cruger to the prince as Von Barwig
bowed himself out of the box a few minutes later.

"Yes, and a fine musician," said the prince.  "But he's not at his best
to-night."

As Von Barwig passed through the artists' room, Poons approached him.
Anton motioned him away as if to say, "Don't speak to me," and Poons
walked sadly away.

The second part of the programme was to begin with Von Barwig's latest
work.

"Quick, put the score of the symphony on my desk," he said to the
librarian, who happened to be passing at the moment.  "I intended to
conduct it from memory; but I have forgotten."

As the librarian placed the score on the conductor's desk, he thought it
strange that a man who had been rehearsing from memory for weeks should
so suddenly forget.

Von Barwig opened the score a few moments later, raised his baton, and
the wood wind began the new work.  He conducted as mechanically as
before, for his dead heart could pump no enthusiasm into his work, and
the audience suddenly felt a sense of disappointment.  But after the
first few passages had been played the leader lost his self-consciousness
and forgot his surroundings.  He began to feel the music, to compose it
again, and the mechanism of the conductor was lost in the inspiration of
the composer.  It was a beautiful movement marked _andante
sostenuto_--pathos itself, and Von Barwig drew from his men their very
souls, forcing them in turn to draw out of their strings all the
suffering he had been going through for the past few days.  Then a
curious psychic phenomenon took place.  Von Barwig completely forgot
himself, his audience, his orchestra; he was living in his music, and the
music took him back to the precise moment of inspiration.  Once more he
was in his studio, seated at his work table, looking up from his score
into the face of his beloved Elene.  She was smiling at him, encouraging
him to go on with his work, the work that she had prophesied would make
him famous and her the happiest of women.  This dream had almost the
appearance of reality to Von Barwig.  Indeed it was real, as real as
reality itself, until the wild applause of an enthusiastic audience awoke
him alike to the consciousness of the success of his work and the
hopeless misery of his present position; his success in his music only
accentuating the failure his life had become.

The playing of this movement made such an impression that Von Barwig was
compelled again and again to acknowledge the plaudits of the audience.
Indeed, they wanted him to repeat it, but this he steadfastly refused to
do.  There was a slight intermission between the playing of the first and
the second parts of the symphony, and during this pause the librarian
handed a note to Von Barwig, whispering to him, "You must read it.  The
woman is outside in hysterics."

"What woman?" demanded Von Barwig, his thoughts reverting to his wife.

Trembling and fearful of he knew not what the leader read the following
hastily scrawled note:


"Come at once.  The _Fraeulein_ is gone.  She has been stolen away.
Please come.  GRETCHEN."


Von Barwig crushed the note in his hand and looked about helplessly,
almost lurching forward in his bewilderment.

"Helene stolen?  What did it mean?"  He could not understand.

He knew instinctively it was time to go on with the next movement, and
that he must make an effort for the sake of others.  Already there were
signs of impatience in the great audience.  Slowly he stepped upon the
dais, steadying himself by means of the music-stand.  He raised his
baton, his men played the opening bars, and as they did so the full
meaning of the awful news he had just read flashed upon him.  He realised
suddenly that his men were no longer with him; the first violin looked up
at him panic stricken.  He sawed the air wildly as he felt the great
audience surging around him and his orchestra swaying to and fro.  Then
he reeled, stumbled, clutching at the music-stand for support; and fell
face forward upon the floor.

      *      *      *      *      *      *

Some six weeks later loving friends had gently nursed him back to life
and reason.  It was slow work, but Von Barwig weathered the point of
death and sailed slowly into the harbour of life.  As he grew stronger,
he realised by degrees all that had happened.  One day he called for his
beloved Poons, but they did not dare to tell him that his faithful friend
was dead; the shock of that night had brought on a stroke from which
Poons never recovered.  When they did tell him long afterward, he only
smiled, shook his head sadly, and said, "Why not?  All is gone!  Why
should my old friend remain to me?"

When Von Barwig was strong enough he took the train to Berlin and
consulted with the police authorities in reference to the whereabouts of
his lost wife and child; but they had left no trace behind them except an
indication that they had passed through Paris on their way to some
unknown destination.  He called on Mr. Cruger, the American Ambassador,
who could throw no light on the subject.  A search of the steamship lists
failed to reveal their whereabouts; and at last, though Anton Von Barwig
felt that they were hopelessly lost to him, he returned to Leipsic, more
than ever determined to find them.  It was the only idea he had: to find
them--to find them--to find them.  His other thoughts were without
stimulating power--irresolute, vague, uncertain.  This one idea grew and
grew until it became an obsession.  He could no longer bear the sound of
music; so it was no sacrifice to him to give up his profession.  He hated
the very streets he walked in, for had Elene not walked in them?  He must
find her; he must find his child.  He could hear the little girl calling
for him, he kept telling himself.  It was his only duty, his only object
and mission in life; so it became an ideal, a religion.  But where to go,
where to go?  Finally, he made up his mind to leave Leipsic for Paris and
start from there.  One day, after living in Paris for some months, the
idea occurred to him to go to America, the place of the man's birth.  A
week later he packed up all his effects and took passage on a steamer
sailing for the port of New York.




Chapter Four

It was a hot August afternoon in New York, especially hot in the
downtown districts, where it was damp and muggy, for it had been
drizzling all the morning.  The sun blazing behind the thin vapour-like
clouds had converted the rain into steam, and the almost complete
absence of a breeze had added to the personal discomfort of those who
were compelled to be out of doors.  Altogether it was a most
uncomfortable afternoon; and the task of running up and down stairs and
answering the front door-bell increased the misery of the maid of all
work in Miss Husted's furnished-room establishment on Houston Street,
near Second Avenue.

"Phew, ain't it a scorcher?" muttered the young woman as she mounted
the kitchen stairs in answer to some visitor's second tug at the bell.
She walked across the hall that led to the front door.

"Don't the dratted bell keep goin'," she went on as she tugged open the
door, which the damp weather had caused to swell and stick to the
door-jamb.

"Forgot your key?" she said as she recognised Signor Tagliafico, better
known as Fico, the third-floor, hall-bedroom "guest," as Miss Husted
insisted on calling her lodgers.

"Forgot your key?" repeated the girl, as the gentleman from Italy
shrugged his shoulders and otherwise disported himself in an endeavour
to convey to her the news that he had lost his key and felt extremely
sorry to trouble her.

"Keys is made to open doors, not to forget," continued the girl,
banging the door shut.

The noise brought Miss Husted out into the hall in less time than it
takes to state the fact.

"What is it, Thurza?" she asked, showing evidence of being startled out
of a doze by the noise.

"Third floor front forgot his key, Miss Houston," said the girl
sulkily, as Fico trudged upstairs to his room.

"I wouldn't mind if he wasn't behind three weeks," said Miss Husted,
who usually answered to the name of Miss Houston, chiefly because she
lived in Houston Street.

"Well, _I_ mind it," muttered the girl to herself, "whether he's behind
or whether he isn't.  It makes work for me, and there ain't enough time
for regular, let alone extras," she went on, as she turned to go down
stairs to the kitchen.

"Quite right," said Miss Husted, as she closed the door and returned to
her room.  Experience had taught her that it was useless to argue with
Thurza.  The girl was open to impression, but not to explanation; once
an idea found lodgment in her brain it stayed there, despite all
argument to the contrary.  It was most mortifying to Miss Husted that
Thurza had such deep-rooted prejudices against every guest that found
his way into her establishment.  Lodgers made work; the more lodgers
the more work; ergo, lodgers were enemies, is the way Thurza reasoned
it out; and she resumed her occupation of cleaning silver (save the
mark) almost as cheerfully as she had left it to answer the door-bell.

"Dear me," sighed Miss Husted, "how hard it is to get help and how much
harder it is to keep them!  Back again already?  Why, Jenny, you must
have flown!" this last to a rather pretty little girl who had just
entered the door.

"Yes, aunt," replied the girl, "I knew Thurza must be busy--so--I--I
hurried."

"I can see that," her aunt said reprovingly, "you are dripping wet; you
shouldn't walk so fast in this hot weather."

Jenny was a thoughtful child.  She had lived rather an unhappy
existence with her parents, for her father had deserted her mother when
she was three years old and after her mother's death she had come to
her aunt "for a few days" until a home could be found for her.  The few
days were over some years before, for Miss Husted loved the child far
too well to let her go, and gladly made a home for her.  Jenny loved
her aunt and stayed on.  Curiously enough, not a word had ever been
spoken between them on the subject, and the little girl just fitted in,
adapting herself to Aunt Sarah's ways.  Now this process of adjustment
was by no means an easy accomplishment, for Aunt Sarah had no sense of
time.  She thought and felt herself to be just as young as she was
years and years ago.

Her looking-glass must have given her several hard jolts, but she
either believed a looking-glass to be an illusion or ignored its
evidence altogether; for though it showed her the face of a woman near
the danger line of fifty, she insisted on considering herself as in the
neighbourhood of thirty.  She carried herself with the dignity of a
duchess; that is, a conventional duchess, and talked habitually with
the hauteur and elegance of a stage queen.  Her kingdom was the Houston
Street establishment, her guests were her subjects, her aristocracy
were the foreign gentlemen who occupied rooms in the various parts of
her house, mostly hall bedrooms.  She doted on fashion, refinement,
pungent perfumery and expensive flowers; anything that to her mind
suggested social grandeur appealed intensely to her.  Even the old
house, now situated in an exceedingly unfashionable quarter, held a
place in her affections because years before it had been a part of
fashionable New York, and she felt quite proud because she was known as
Miss Houston of Houston Street.  The name suggested a title, and a
title of all things was dear to her heart.  Perhaps her love for Jenny
was stronger because her father was supposed--by his unfortunate wife
at least--to have been the scion of a proud and aristocratic family,
who had not been too proud, however, to leave her to starve.
Altogether, Miss Husted was an exceedingly romantic, high-strung,
middle-aged spinster, miles and miles above her station in life, whose
heart and purse were open to any foreigner who had discernment enough
to see her weakness and tact enough to pander to it by hinting at his
noble lineage.  This love of things and beings aristocratic was more
than a weakness.  It was a disease, for it kept poor a good soul, who
otherwise might have been, if not well-to-do, at least fairly
prosperous.

Jenny, young as she was, knew all this.  She knew that Fico, or Signor
Tagliafico, was a struggling musician and not an artist in any sense of
the word.  She knew he was an ordinary Italian fiddler who preferred to
fiddle for food rather than to work manually for it.  And yet her aunt
had confided to her that she was sure he was a count, because one day
Miss Husted had asked him the question, and the man, not quite
understanding, had smiled and shrugged his shoulders.  Still, he had
not denied it, so thenceforth was known as Count Fico.

And Pinac, the gentleman who occupied the other back room next to that
of Fico?  Miss Husted was sure that he was a descendant of the noble
refugees from France, who emigrated during the Reign of Terror in the
French Revolution.  The romance of this appealed highly to her.
Monsieur Pinac was always silent when questioned on this point, but
Miss Husted was much interested.  His silence surely meant something,
and besides, he looked every inch a nobleman with his fashionably cut
Van Dyck beard.  There was a picture of the Duc de Guise in one of the
bedrooms--Heavens only knows where Miss Husted got it, but there it
was--and pointing to it with great pride, she defied Monsieur Pinac to
deny his relationship to the defunct duke.  Pinac did not take the
trouble to deny it!  As a matter of fact, he was simply an ordinary
musician who continued to follow his profession because it paid him
better than any other business he could embark in.  Music is often the
line of easiest resistance, and many there be that slide down its
graceful curves.  In more senses than one, it is easier to play than to
work.  But when Miss Husted conferred a patent of nobility on a foreign
gentleman, were he an Italian organ-grinder or a French waiter, that
title stood, his own protest to the contrary notwithstanding.  In this
particular view-point Miss Husted was completely opposite to her maid
of all work.

Thurza's mental attitude was the socialistic slant that made for the
destruction of aristocracy; Miss Husted's system created one of her
own.  To Thurza foreigners were either "dagoes" or "Dutch"; to Miss
Husted they were either "gentlemen" or "noblemen" or both.  In this
way, perhaps, the balance of harmony was restored in Houston Mansion,
as Miss Husted dearly loved to call her home.  There was some
foundation for believing that the name Houston Mansion was painted on
the glass over the front door, but it was so worn that no one could
decipher it.

A violent ring at the door-bell interrupted the conversation between
Miss Husted and her niece.

"They'll break the bell if they're not careful," remarked the elder
lady, arranging her ringlets in the event that it might be some one to
see her.

"It's a lady," whispered Jenny to her aunt a few moments later.  "She
wants a room."

Miss Husted sniffed.  "I don't like ladies; they're twice the trouble
that gentlemen are, and--I don't know--I don't like 'em.  Ladies
looking for furnished rooms always have a history--and a past; I don't
like 'em."

Jenny nodded without in the least understanding her aunt.  She had
heard this before, but she knew it was a peculiarity of Miss Husted
always to say the same thing under the same circumstances, whether the
occasion called for it or not.

"Shall I ask her in, or will you come out into the hall?" went on the
child.

"Ask her kindly to step into the reception-room," said her aunt,
kicking a feather duster under the sofa and generally tidying up a bit.

A large, stout person of uncertain age stood in the doorway.

"Is this the reception-room?" asked the lady, fixing her glasses and
looking about her as if quite prepared to disbelieve any statement Miss
Husted was about to make.  That lady, much offended, drew herself up
stiffly.

"Yes, this is the reception-room," she said, in a tone intended to be
frigidly polite.  "May I inquire to what am I indebted for the honour
of this visit?"

The fat lady sniffed contemptuously and sat down.

"I think it's the sign 'Furnished Rooms' that can claim the honour,"
she said simply.

"Sit down, Jenny, and stop fidgeting," Miss Husted snapped out,
ignoring the fat lady's attempt at smartness.

"I want a room if you have one vacant.  My name is Mangenborn."

"Top floor?" inquired Miss Husted.

"I suppose you think a lady of my avoirdupois ought to live on the top
floor so as to have plenty of exercise, eh?" inquired Mrs. Mangenborn
with an attempt at humour.  Then, without waiting for a reply, she went
on:

"Well, you've just guessed right!  What kind of people do you have in
this house?"

"My guests are artists and gentlemen."

"Which?" inquired the stout lady, and laughed; she saw the joke if Miss
Husted didn't and was good natured enough to laugh even if it were her
own.  "Well, I'm an artist," she said after a pause.

"Indeed?" said Miss Husted, and there was a slight inflection of
sarcasm in that lady's voice.

Mrs. Mangenborn was either deaf or did not notice it, for she went on
unconsciously:

"Yes, I am an artist--a second-sight artist."

"Second-sight?"

"Yes; I tell fortunes, read the future----"

"Oh?" said Miss Husted, and that one word was enough to have driven an
ordinary person out of the front door, convinced of being insulted, but
Mrs. Mangenborn was not sensitive.

"I should like a cup of tea," she said simply.  "It's a very hot day."

The magnificent coolness of this request fairly caught Miss Husted.
This woman spoke like one accustomed to command; and much to Jenny's
astonishment (she had been listening attentively) her aunt sent her to
order tea for two.

Given a person who can tell fortunes, and another person on the lookout
for one, a person who has infinite hope in the future, whose whole life
indeed is in the future, and it doesn't take long to establish an
_entente cordiale_.  When Jenny came back a few minutes later, to her
utter astonishment she saw the mysterious fat lady dealing cards to her
aunt and talking of events past, present, and future; and her aunt
chatting as pleasantly as if she had known the woman all her life.

"However can you tell that?" asked Miss Husted as she sipped her tea
and cut the cards for the ninetieth time.

"Don't you see the king?  That means a visitor!"

"Yes; but how did you know that my best first-floor rooms were to let?"

Mrs. Mangenborn shrugged her shoulders and smiled.

"_That_ I cannot tell you; I can't even tell myself; it just comes to
me."

She did not remind Miss Husted that the best rooms in most boarding
establishments in that locality were usually to let, because the people
who could afford to pay the price seldom wanted to live in that
neighbourhood; but she did tell her several things that must have
pleased her immensely, for in a short while, after Mrs. Mangenborn had
disposed of a second cup of tea, that lady was fairly ensconced in a
seven-dollar front room on the first floor for a price that did not
exceed three dollars.  However, if half her predictions came true, it
would have been a fine bargain for Miss Husted or any other landlady to
have her as a guest.

As Jenny confided to Thurza in the kitchen a few hours later:

"You'll see.  If the ground-floor parlor and bedroom aren't let next
week, the new lady in the first floor front will get notice to leave
because she's told a fortune that won't come true, and aunt will be
angry.  She keeps her word and she always expects people to keep
theirs."

"My fortune never came true," grunted Thurza as she lifted a tub of
washing off the table.

"Jenny, Mrs. Mangenborn wants you to go on an errand for her," called
her aunt downstairs.

"Thought she wasn't never goin' to take females in her home again,"
said Thurza, as Jenny went upstairs to obey her aunt's order.

As Jenny closed the front door gently on her way to the stores, she
mused sadly on the fact that her aunt, and not Mrs. Mangenborn, had
given her the money with which to make the purchases.  She hoped with
childish optimism that the second-sight lady would pay her back; the
other guests never did.  Jenny sighed as she thought how much easier it
would be on rent-days if auntie didn't advance money.

The front-door bell rang so often that day that Thurza declared it rang
when it didn't ring, and was equally positive that the dratted bell
didn't ring when it did ring.  At all events, when the bell had been
nearly jerked out of its socket for the third time, Miss Husted poked
her head out of Mrs. Mangenborn's room and shouted for Thurza to hurry
up and answer it.  As she received no answer, she went down a flight to
the head of the kitchen stairs, and gave vent to a most unusual display
of temper.  This was brought on by the fact that Mrs. Mangenborn had
just declared that never in all her born days (to say nothing of her
unborn moments) had she seen such a wonderful display of good fortune
as that which lay in the cards spread on the table before them; there
was a marriage just as sure as death.  Mrs. Mangenborn was proceeding
to describe the masculine element in the marriage proposition, and Miss
Husted was trying to think who it could be, when the bell rang for the
third time just as Thurza's head made its appearance above the kitchen
stairs.  Miss Husted decided to forget her dignity and go to the door
herself.

Outside stood a hack piled up with baggage, and on the doorstep,
waiting patiently, stood a gentleman who bowed when the door was opened
and asked gently with a foreign accent, if Miss Husted had a room for a
studio and a bedroom.  There was much bustle and excitement, a great
deal of noise, and a still greater deal of confusion, but when it had
subsided and the hackman had been paid three times as much as he was
legally entitled to, the baggage was carried, or rather tumbled, into
the rooms engaged by the gentleman with the foreign accent.  Miss
Husted rushed into Mrs. Mangenborn's room and breathlessly gasped that
her fortune had come true, for the front parlor and bedroom were let at
their full prices.

"Just think of it, Mrs. Mangborn," as Miss Husted insisted on calling
her "guest," "just think of it, full price in summer!"

Mrs. Mangenborn rose to the occasion.

"Why not?" demanded she, as if offended by Miss Husted's enthusiasm,
"why not?  The cards never lie!  How much do you say he is to pay?" she
went on, as if Miss Husted had told her and she had forgotten the
precise amount.

"Fourteen," replied Miss Husted, "and it's a good price."

"Not bad!  But wait, you'll see that's only the beginning," and Mrs.
Mangenborn mixed up the cards lying on the table oblivious of the fact
that she had just shuffled Miss Husted's marital prospects out of
existence.

"Oh, that's nothing," she hastened to say as she saw the expression of
alarm on Miss Husted's face.  "It'll come out again.  It's in the cards
and it must come out."  Then she asked, "Who is he?  What is he?"

"He's an artist of some sort, a fine, noble-looking old gentleman.
German! oh such fine, elegant manners; to the manner born I am sure!  A
musician, I think; he had a violin with him."

Mrs. Mangenborn's nose elevated itself a little.

"No money in music!  What's his name?" she asked.

"I don't know," said Miss Husted.  "He gave me his card, but I was so
flustered I didn't look at it."

She opened the reticule she always carried at her side, containing
keys, recipes, receipts, almost everything that could be crowded into
it, and after quite a little sifting and sorting she took out a card on
which was inscribed:

"Herr Anton Von Barwig."




Chapter Five

There was a decided air of mystery about the new occupant of the
parlor-floor suite, or at least so it appeared to Miss Husted of
Houston Street.  As a matter of fact, Herr Von Barwig minded his own
business and evidently expected every one else to do likewise, for he
kept his door and his ears closed to all polite advances during the
first few days after his arrival at Houston Mansion.  Despite Miss
Husted's oft-repeated inquiries after the professor's health (the title
had been conferred on him by virtue of his possessing a violin and on
the arrival of a piano for his room), despite her endeavours to direct
conversation into a channel which might lead to a discussion of his
personal affairs, Herr Von Barwig remained tacit; hence a mystery
attached itself to the personality of the professor.  It is a curious
fact that the one gentleman of genuine title that found his way into
the Houston Street establishment was ruthlessly shorn of his right to
distinction and dubbed professor, which sobriquet clung to him for
many, many years.  However, this did not annoy Herr Von Barwig, for he
had not yet realised that in America every concertina and rag-time
piano-player, as well as barber, corn-doctor, and teacher of the manly
art of boxing, is entitled to the distinction of being called professor.

"The professor has beautiful manners--oh, such beautiful manners,"
confided Miss Husted to her new friend, Mrs. Mangenborn, about two
weeks after his arrival.  "Every time I speak he bows, and there's oh,
such dignity, such grace in the bending of his head.  How polite he is,
too; he always says, 'No, madam, thank you;' or 'yes, if madam will be
so kind,' and then he bows again and waits for me to go."

"Is that all he says?" inquired Mrs. Mangenborn.  "I guess he knows how
to keep his mouth shut, then!  If you want a man to talk never ask him
questions; men are a suspicious lot."

"Ah, but _he_ is different," said Miss Husted.  "He has such a sad,
far-away, wistful look in his noble, dark eyes."

"That may be, but far-away looks don't pay any rent for you!  You can't
attach any importance to things like that.  My first husband had a
far-away look, and I haven't seen him for ten years.  That Steinway
grand the professor's got, did he hire it or buy it?  A man's got to
have money to support one of those instruments," went on Mrs.
Mangenborn.

"I don't know," replied Miss Husted, who could not help thinking that
her friend had a somewhat mercenary mind.  "No one's been to see him,
so he hasn't got it for his friends; his violin has a beautiful sound.
Mr. Pinac tells me that it must be a rare old instrument."

The door-bell was heard ringing, but no one seemed to pay any attention
to it until they heard the whistle that followed; then everybody
bustled about.  The postman always created a little excitement in
Houston Street, and his arrival was the one occasion on which even
Thurza hurried to the door.  It was also the one occasion on which she
need not have done so, for she invariably found Miss Rusted or one of
the guests ahead of her.

"Registered letter for Herr Von Barwig."

"I'll take it to him," said Miss Husted sweetly.

"He's got to come and sign it himself," said the letter-carrier,
shaking his head.

"Where's it from?" asked Mrs. Mangenborn, her head appearing over the
bannisters.

Miss Husted looked at the letter-carrier inquiringly, but that official
appeared not to have heard the question.  At all events, he made no
reply, and Miss Husted knocked on the professor's door.

"Come in."

Miss Husted opened the door.

"Ah, madam, what can I do for you?" said Von Barwig, rising from the
table at which he was writing.

Miss Husted smiled sweetly.  She noticed that he was writing music, so
he must be a composer as well as a professor.

"Will you please come and sign for a registered letter?" she said.

"Ah, yes!  I come at once."

He arose, held the door open for Miss Husted to pass out, bowing to her
as she did so, and then coming into the hallway, fulfilled the postal
requirements, totally unconscious that several pairs of eyes were
watching the operation.  The letter-carrier handed him two letters; one
bearing the postmark Leipsic, the other that of New York.

Von Barwig returned to his room and read the following from a firm of
stock brokers:


"_Herr Anton Von Barwig_.

"DEAR SIR: Pursuant to your instructions, we have sold the balance of
the securities you left with us, but they have so depreciated in value
during your seven years' absence from Leipsic, that we hesitated to
sell them at their present market price.  However, your instructions in
regard to these securities were definite and we have obeyed them.
Hoping this will meet with your satisfaction, we remain,

"Yours obediently,

  "BERNSTEIN & DEUTSCH."


A draft on Drexel, Morgan's bank, for $1,000 dropped from Von Barwig's
hand; he picked it up mechanically and looked at it.

"The last, the very last, barely one-tenth the price I paid for them,"
he thought; and sighing, put the draft into a pocketbook and deposited
it in an inner pocket.

The other letter was from a detective agency in Eighth Street, and read
as follows:


"DEAR SIR: Call on us at your earliest convenience.  We have news.

"HATCH & BUCKLEY."


That was all, but it was enough to cause Von Barwig to change hastily
from his slippers and dressing-gown to his shoes and hat; and to be out
in the street in less than one minute after reading the letter.

"News, news, news!  Good God, is it possible?  No, no!  I mustn't
believe it; I dare not.  Helene, Helene, my little girl!  No, no, I
won't; I won't!" and he read the letter again.  "After all," he mused,
"it may be news of a thousand little girls and yet not of mine.  I beg
your pardon, madam!"  In turning from Houston Street into the Bowery,
still reading the letter, he had bumped suddenly into a middle-aged
lady, who retaliated by deliberately pushing him back, at the same time
asking him a somewhat unnecessary question as to where he was going.
Then she had gone on her way without waiting to hear his apology.

Hatch & Buckley's private detective agency, situated just off Broadway
and Eighth Street, had a large office divided into several small
offices.  For some occult reason only one person could get in or out at
a time, and this made confidential conversation a necessity rather than
a matter of choice.  The senior member of the firm was in when Von
Barwig called.  Be it understood at the beginning that this large,
stout personage, who invariably spoke in a whisper, and referred so
often to his partner, had no partner but a number of detectives on his
staff, to whom he was wont to speak or whisper of as partner when
discussing what they had ferreted out or left undiscovered.  This man,
fat, florid, and fifty, had been a central office detective for many
years.  After a time, being exceedingly useful in a political sense, he
had been admitted to the inner circle at Tammany Hall and was at
present one of the leading geniuses in that hallowed body of faithful
public servitors.

"Come in, come in," said this gentleman urbanely as Von Barwig stood
waiting as patiently as he could for the news he was so anxious to hear.

"Well, I think we've got something," he added.

Von Barwig said nothing; he waited to hear more.

"First of all, business before pleasure," said Mr. Hatch, and suited
the action to the word by handing Von Barwig a bill for $556.84, for
"services rendered."

"Yes, yes; but tell me the news!" faltered Von Barwig, without looking
at the bill.  "Have you found her?  Tell me!"  The pleading look in Von
Barwig's face would have melted the heart of any ordinary scoundrel;
but Mr. Hatch was no ordinary scoundrel.

"It's customary, Mr. Barwig," he said drily, "to settle one account
before opening another."

Von Barwig looked at the bill that had been handed to him, saw the
amount, shook his head pathetically, and smiled.  "There must be some
mistake," he said.

"My partner went to California on this clue and followed it clean to
British Columbia; railroad fares alone amount to two fifty; there's
hotel bills, carfare; there's salaries, office expenses, stamps; and
then--there's me."  If Mr. Hatch had put himself first there would have
been little need to refer to the other items.

"There's the vouchers," he went on, pushing a lot of papers toward Von
Barwig.  "Everything O.K.'d; everything on the level, open and above
board."  He leaned back in his chair as if determined not to say
another word until the matter was settled.

"Then you refuse to tell me any more until this is paid?"

"Not at all, not at all!  I'd just as leave tell you right now; but it
wouldn't be business, it wouldn't be business."  He repeated this as if
to impress his listener with the importance of the business aspect of
the situation being well preserved.

"You are right; it is not business!  It is life and death; it's my
heart, my soul, my very existence!  My little girl, my little Helene is
not business."

"I suppose not," assented the fat man, "not to you; but our end of it
rests on a commercial basis.  We've laid out the money and we're
entitled to be paid for it."

"But I have paid you already so much!  I cannot afford more.  For years
I have hunted high and low for my wife and child through city after
city for thousands upon thousands of miles.  At last I came to you, and
there have been months and months of weary waiting, hunting false
clues; disappointments upon disappointments."

"I know, I know," nodded the senior partner.  "That's part of the game."

"I have spent with you nearly all the money I have, and nothing has
come of it.  Every now and then you raise my hopes by saying you have
found her.  Then, when the news comes, you ask for more money and when
I have given it, it is again a false clue."

"That ain't our fault!" observed the stout gentleman.  "My partner
follows a clue, and you can't blame him if it don't turn out exactly
the right one.  This fellow Ahlmann is an eel; that's what he is, an
eel!  But I think we've got him now, I'm almost sure!"

"You think?" eagerly inquired Von Barwig.

"Well, of course there's nothing absolutely sure, but this is the last
report he's sent in.  Seems to me to pretty well cover the case, but
it's been a hard job.  This fellow Ahlmann has completely covered his
tracks."

"The child?  She--she lives?"

"Oh, yes; yes!"

"And the mother?"

"I think he's located them all.  I can't tell you for sure till I read
the report again."

Von Barwig, his hands trembling with excitement, wrote a cheque for the
amount required, and with breathless impatience awaited the information
as to the whereabouts of his lost wife and child.

"They're in Chicago," said Hatch, taking up the cheque and scanning it.

"Both of them?" asked Von Barwig in a hoarse whisper.

"Both of them," repeated Hatch, conveniently remembering the detail
without reading the report.  "George, bring me Mr. Bailey's telegram in
the Barwig case," and when George, a smart young office boy, brought
the required documents, he was quietly instructed by his employer to
cash Von Barwig's cheque immediately.

"When will you go?" asked Mr. Hatch.

"As soon as possible."

"To-night?"

"Yes."

"Here's the address," and Mr. Hatch handed him a card.  "You'll meet my
partner there, 1120 State Avenue; he'll take you to the parties.  Shall
I get your railroad tickets?"

"No.  I--I get them."

"It's twenty-six hours to Chicago; you'll need a Pullman ticket."

"Thank you; I get them."

"Well, just as you say.  Good luck to you, Mr. Barwig."

"Thank you," said Von Barwig simply.  He did not tell Mr. Hatch that he
had nearly come to the end of his resources and that he would ride in
the day car.  Not that he felt ashamed of not being able to afford
luxuries, but he instinctively resented making a confidant of a man
like the senior partner of the firm of Hatch & Buckley.

As he walked rapidly toward Houston Street he found himself thinking
for the first time since his arrival in America of the question of his
future, but this question did not occupy his mind long.  Like all his
ideas on any subject other than that of his lost wife and child, it was
forced into the background.  As he neared his rooms in Houston Street
his hopes began to rise; and the prospect of going to Chicago, the
possibility of seeing his wife and child, began to work in his mind.
His heart began to beat tumultuously.  This time his dream would come
true, and in his mind's eye he clasped his little girl tightly to
himself and rained kisses on her little upturned face.  He even found
it in his heart to forgive the mother; after all, she was the mother of
his little one, that he could never forget.

As for Ahlmann, he could not picture him; his mind refused to conjure
up a thought of the man.  It seemed as if he were dead, and that Von
Barwig was on his way to rescue the wife and child from some danger
that threatened them.  This work of rescue was the fulfilment of an
ideal.  Nothing should be allowed to stand in the way of it!  The
senior partner of Hatch & Buckley had been quick to note this condition
of mind and to reap the profits that came therefrom.  Monomania means
money, was a business axiom in that gentleman's office, but he had
pumped the stream dry and Von Barwig was now at the end of his
resources.  By some strange process of thought, Von Barwig recognised
this fact, but it seemed to him to mean that because his money had come
to an end his search had also come to an end.  The result of his trip
to Chicago could not but be favourable, because he dared not think of
its failure.  So great is the influence of hope upon imagination that
by the time Von Barwig reached his rooms he was already contemplating
the possibility of keeping his wife and child there, at least until he
could obtain better quarters for them.  So, when he opened the door of
his room, and found Jenny there polishing the brass andirons, he took
more notice than usual of the little girl, and to her intense joy
promised to bring her a box of candy from out West, where he told her
he was going as he busied himself packing his handbag.

In a few hours Anton Von Barwig, his heart beating high in expectation,
was seated in one of the day coaches of a fast Pennsylvania Railroad
train on his way to Chicago.

[Illustration: The "music master" can no longer pay rent for the piano.]




Chapter Six

Von Barwig had left New York with a light heart.  Hope had ripened into
expectation, and for the first time since his arrival in America, seven
years since, he had felt something like a positive assurance that this
time his mission was going to result favourably.  Hatch had assured him
that his partner had positively found the missing wife and child; and
Von Barwig had gradually allowed himself to think it possible, then
probable, and finally he became almost certain of the successful result
of his journey to Chicago.

As Jenny watched him pack his valise on the afternoon he left for
Chicago, she had noticed that now and then his face beamed with
happiness, the happiness of expected joy.  And when he jokingly asked
her how she would like to be his little girl, it made her, so happy
that she wanted to throw her arms around his neck and cry on his
shoulder.  She felt that he was just the kind of father she would like
to have, but the conversation didn't get very far, for Von Barwig had a
train to catch and was too busy to hear the little girl's response to
his question.

Jenny thought he was not quite in earnest, certainly not so deeply in
earnest as she was.  Her aunt did not quite understand her, and she
needed some one to whom she could open her heart.  She felt that Mr.
Von Barwig would listen to her little confidences and sympathise with
her; perhaps even tell her his troubles.  Young as the girl was, she
felt that the man had suffered.  She couldn't tell why, but her little
heart had gone out to him in sympathy almost from the moment she saw
him.  How it was she could not have explained, but she loved him.
Jenny thought these things over long after Mr. Von Barwig had departed
on his journey.  It made her glad to think how happy he was when he
left the house with his valise and umbrella, hurrying to catch the
little bobtail car that wended its way across town to the Pennsylvania
ferry.

So it came about that when Jenny, looking out of the window some few
days later, saw him coming up the street slowly, disconsolately, almost
dragging himself along, the little girl experienced a great shock.  The
man seemed to have changed altogether.  It was the same dear Mr. Von
Barwig, yes, but the eyes of love cannot be deceived; he looked older,
and oh, so careworn and tired!  She rushed to the door at once, to save
him the trouble of finding his night key, and greeted him with
affectionate inquiry.  To her intense disappointment, he nodded
absentmindedly to signify his appreciation of her act.  The faint,
ghost of a smile came over his face, but he did not look at her.
Silently he opened the door to his room and passed into it without
speaking, closing the door firmly behind him.  Jenny's heart sank; she
felt rather than knew that her friend was in trouble, for he did not
pat her on the head or pinch her cheek as he had always done before
when she opened the door for him.

Her inability to be of any service to him only added to the child's
sorrow; tears came into her eyes as she stood looking at the closed
door, for she felt completely shut out of his life.  At supper that
night, when her aunt asked her "what ailed her," and invited Mrs.
Mangenborn to look at "Jenny's long face," the child tried to laugh,
failed completely, and burst into a flood of tears.  Jenny could not
have explained to herself the whys and wherefores of her tearful
outburst, but the child could not forget poor Von Barwig's drawn,
haggard face and its weary, hopeless expression.

"She's a queer child," commented Mrs. Mangenborn, when Jenny had gone
to bed that night.

"Her father had blue blood," replied Miss Husted impressively, "and you
always find hysterical natures in high-born families."

"I shouldn't wonder," agreed her friend; "something is wrong with the
child, that's plain."

"What do you suppose it is," said Miss Husted, rather anxiously.
"Perhaps she's working up for an illness!  Oh, dear," she went on,
almost in tears, for shallow as she was herself, she loved the child
deeply, "shall I send for a doctor?  I think I'd better; I always feel
safer with a doctor in the house."

"Wait till the morning," suggested Mrs. Mangenborn; "if anything's
going to develop, you'll know what it is by then."

"Do you think anything will develop?" inquired Miss Husted, clutching
Mrs. Mangenborn by the arm.

"I don't know for certain," replied her friend, "but it can't be much
anyway, or I'd have seen it there," pointing to a pack of cards on the
mantelpiece.  "Wait a moment," she said suddenly, and then she knit her
brows as if thinking very hard; "didn't the six of spades come out
true?  Yes, it did!" and she shook her head thoughtfully.

"I shan't feel comfortable till I go and see her," said Miss Husted,
now thoroughly alarmed; and taking a lamp from a side table, the good
lady went upstairs to look at her niece.

"That six of spades surely came out for something," muttered Mrs.
Mangenborn to herself.  "Six is tragedy!  Well, we must take what
comes," she continued philosophically as she helped herself liberally
to some chocolate caramels that Miss Husted had thoughtfully, or
thoughtlessly, left on the table.

In the meantime, another tragedy of a very different sort was being
enacted in the room on the parlor floor--the tragedy of the death of
hope.  For when Anton Von Barwig closed the door of his room on the
evening of his return from Chicago, he closed it finally and forever
upon hope, and gave himself up completely to dull, grim, sodden
despair.  Not only this, but he cursed himself for ever having hoped.
He never suspected for a moment that the eminent firm of Hatch &
Buckley had wilfully deceived him, for Mr. Hatch's partner almost cried
with vexation and disappointment when he found that the woman and child
he pointed out were not the "parties" they were looking for.  Indeed,
Mr. Buckley's grief was so poignant that Von Barwig almost felt sorry
for the man, who declared that his professional honour as a detective
was ruined from that moment.  It was, in this case, for Von Barwig made
up his mind at once never to employ him again.

The summer twilight was fast deepening into night as Von Barwig sat
staring out of his window, looking at the passers-by and seeing them
not.  He rebelled against fate, conditions, life; and for the first
time in his career he railed at his Creator.  He had asked for light,
and no light came in answer to his prayer; only more darkness, more
disappointment, more loneliness.  He sat with bowed head, wondering
what was the meaning of it all.  Who could solve the problem; who could
straighten out his tangled life; who could explain it?  Was the devil
really and truly greater than God--the God who is Love?

Von Barwig had read Nietzsche, Schopenhauer, Haeckel, all the school of
pessimistic philosophers that exercised such a tremendous influence
upon the thought of his day; but he had always instinctively rebelled
against the nihilism of their creed, the creed of materialism.  Yet, at
this moment he was perilously near to believing that the force for evil
was greater than the force for good.  There was no love in his life;
and for him love was life itself.  As he sat there with eyes fixed and
staring, seeing nothing, hearing nothing, he thought over the events
that had come to him since his sojourn in America.  For the past seven
years he had devoted every thought, every energy, and nearly every
penny he had to the search for his loved ones.  And he had failed,
failed, failed.

When the first shock of his loss came upon him in Leipsic he had asked
himself the meaning of it, and the answer had come to him that Art had
been his mistress, and that she had stepped in between him and the ones
he loved.  He had been selfish, he had loved his Art as much, more
perhaps, than his own flesh and blood--and this was his punishment.
Yet he had given up his mistress, Art; he no longer lived for her; he
would live for his wife and child, if he could only find them, if, if,
if!  He felt that there was indeed nothing to live for!  Then why live,
he asked himself?  Better be dead; far better be dead!  Who would care
if he were no more?  At this moment Von Barwig caught himself up, and
realising his own danger refused to allow himself to drift along that
line of thought.  Life meant nothing to him now, but live he must, live
he would; that he was determined on.  Complex as the problem was, he
would go on with it.  He was not a coward, and for this he thanked his
Creator.

In thanking Him he gained a little courage, and he asked for a sign,
something to indicate that he was not the sport of fate, the creature
of circumstance; something, anything, to indicate that God had not
completely forgotten him.  With bowed head Von Barwig prayed that he
might be saved from himself; that thoughts of self-destruction might
never again come into his mind; for he felt that he might not always
have the power to reject them.  He asked that the desire to live might
again come upon him; for it dawned upon him that perhaps his duty lay
in the direction of serving others.  Desire is prayer, and Von Barwig's
prayer was answered, for when he looked into the street he saw life
once more.  Opening his window he heard the voices of the children at
play.  He saw their joy, and rejoicing with them, he thanked God that
he could rejoice.  As he arose from his chair he sighed, a deep, deep
sigh, and the darkest moment in his life had passed.

"Was that a knock?" Anton asked himself as he turned toward his door.
"Surely not a visitor?"

Lighting his lamp, he looked at the cuckoo clock upon the wall.  It
said a quarter past nine o'clock; he had not heard the cuckoo strike
seven, eight, or nine!

"Phew!" he whistled, "I had no idea it was so late."  Again the timid
little knock.

"Surely I can't be mistaken again," thought Von Barwig, and walking to
the door he threw it wide open.

To his utter astonishment, a little girl in a white night-gown stood
there, silently sobbing as if her heart would break.

"Why, Jenny, Jenny!" and Von Barwig, taking the trembling child in his
arms, placed her gently in his armchair.  "Jenny, my dear child."

"I--I--couldn't go to sleep until I'd said good-night; I tried to but I
couldn't," sobbed Jenny as soon as she could speak coherently.

"Why, what has happened?" asked Von Barwig, as he covered her with a
travelling rug.

"You asked me to be your little girl, and then, when I said 'Yes,' you
didn't answer; and
I--thought--you--were--angry--with--me--because--because!
When--you--came--in, I felt so sorry for you, and you looked so unhappy
that I had to come down and ask you to forgive me.  I--I just couldn't
help--it.  You're not angry, are you?"

"My dear, dear little girl.  I, angry?" Von Barwig shook his head.
"How could I be angry with you?  Why should I?  Why, it's--it's
impossible!" and Von Barwig laughed at the very idea.  Jenny sighed
deeply and remained silent; she seemed contented simply to be with him.

After a few moments' silence Von Barwig looked at her.

"Is this my answer; is this--my--answer?" he thought, and then he said
slowly, "I am glad, more glad than I can ever tell you, that you have
come to me at this moment."

He looked at the girl thoughtfully; she was not his little Helene, but
he would try to love her as if she were.  Von Barwig took her hand in
his and tenderly stroked her cheek.

"You shall be my little girl, my little one, eh, eh?  You shall!"

"Yes," nodded Jenny, smiling happily, "I'll be your little girl, if
you'll have me."  And from that moment Von Barwig never again felt
quite alone in the world.

At this instant a loud scream was heard, followed by another, and still
another.

Von Barwig rushed into the hallway, followed by Jenny.

"She's gone, gone! jumped out of the window!" screamed Miss Husted,
from the top floor.  "Look! the window's open, and she's gone; jumped
out--gone."

"Who, who?" shouted Thurza, rushing upstairs.

"Jenny, Jenny!" wailed Miss Husted--so excited that she was almost
beside herself.

Jenny and Von Barwig looked at one another in astonishment and the
little girl hurried after Thurza, arriving upstairs just in time to
prevent her aunt from going into hysterics.

"Here I am, auntie," she said, and Miss Husted was so delighted to see
her niece again, that she forgot to scold her.  As she came downstairs
after satisfying herself that Jenny was not only safe and sound, but in
her usual health--she found Herr Von Barwig at the foot of the stairs
waiting for her.

"She is all right, eh, madam?"

"Oh, yes," responded that lady, pleased that Herr Von Barwig should be
interested in the welfare of any member of her family.

"She is a good child; I like her very much, very much."

"Yes, Jenny is a very good girl; her father was a member of one of the
oldest New York families, quite the aristocrat let me tell you!"

"Ah, yes.  Her father is dead?" repeated Von Barwig, "and her mother
also?" he asked.

"I am her only living relative," sighed Miss Husted.

"Ah, I am glad of that," said Von Barwig simply, "Yes--I--Jenny and I
have come to an understanding.  I am her--what you call--not
father-in-law--her--her----"

Von Barwig fumbled a little with the English language until he made
Miss Husted understand that he had taken her niece under his wing, so
to speak; and hoped that she would have no objection.  On the contrary,
Miss Husted was highly pleased, for one of her lodgers had told her
that Von Barwig had been a great man in Germany.

"I shall go out to dinner.  Is there a restaurant near here that you
can recommend?" asked Von Barwig.  "Dinner?  Why it's nearly ten
o'clock!" replied Miss Hasted, "let me get you a cup of tea."

"No, thank you, madam.  I must go into the street, into the _cafe_,
where there is life, and people; I must get away from myself.  Here I
think too much my own thoughts.  Where did you say?"

"Galazatti's across the street is a nice little _cafe_," she replied,
"and he serves a nice _table d'hote_."

"Ah, I shall go there, then.  Thank you, madame.  Good-night!" and Von
Barwig bowing to Miss Husted, closed the front door quietly and went
into the street.




Chapter Seven

When Anton arose the next morning after a refreshing night's rest, he
became conscious that he was looking at the world through different
coloured spectacles; and that there was no longer a dull feeling of
despair gnawing at his heart.  For the first time in many years his
plans for the day did not include a search in this or that direction
for his lost ones.  It was not that he had forgotten, but he thought of
them now as dead and gone; and this certainty, this lack of suspense,
lightened his heart to such an extent that his manner was almost
buoyant.  Realising the fact that he had spent nearly all of the large
sum of money he brought with him from Germany, he thought of his
future, his welfare.  To do for others, he must first do for himself;
he must think of his music again; in short, he must earn a living.  So,
after a light breakfast at Galazatti's, he took an inventory of his
available assets.  They included some old music; some compositions
which he would now try to sell; a genuine Amati violin worth at least
three thousand dollars; a grand piano; one or two paintings; some
silverware, presents, and jewelry; and about eight hundred dollars in
cash.

Von Barwig was completely bewildered; he had purposely avoided meeting
musicians in New York and scarcely any one knew him; those who had
known him by reputation had now completely forgotten his existence.  He
had not felt sufficient interest in affairs going on around him to
realise the state of musical art in America, so he scarcely knew how to
begin.  It seemed like the commencement of a new life.  The period was
that between Jenny Lind and Adelina Patti, and he soon realised that
musical art was at its lowest ebb.  There were one or two ambitious
orchestra conductors in America; one in Chicago trying to introduce the
Wagnerian polyphonic school, and perhaps one or two in New York; but
the public clamoured after divas, prima donnas and tenors with
temperaments and vocal pyrotechnic skill.  For orchestral music there
was little demand.  Wagner was as yet unknown to the public--certainly
he was unheard except on the rarest occasions and the majority of
musicians did not like him because he was difficult to play.

So it happened that Von Barwig's compositions, which were of the modern
German school and rather heavy, did not find a ready market, in fact
they did not find a market at all.  Day after day he would visit the
music stores with his music roll tucked under his arm.  After a few
months the music publishers used to smile when they saw him coming into
their places of business, and shake their heads before he had a chance
even to show them his manuscripts.  As time went on he came to be a
byword among them.

"Here comes poor old Von Barwig," they would say, and then they would
smile at his earnest face with its sad, longing expression and
sympathise with him for his beautiful smile of resignation as he folded
up his package of compositions and went sadly away.  They admired his
technical skill, but thought him very foolish to waste his time on such
"stuff" as they called it.  They advised him to write for the hour, and
not for posterity.

"You must give the public what they want," said Schumein.

"How can you tell what they want if you don't try?" pleaded Von Barwig.
"If you give them only what you acknowledge is bad, how will they ever
know what is better?"

"It's no use," was Schumein's reply, "music like yours has no market
value.  We're not in business for our health; once strike a popular
tune and you'll be famous!"

Von Barwig had never mentioned his Leipsic reputation, and if he had,
in all probability, it would have been useless.  Seven years is a long
time for even a genius to remain in obscurity.

"Bring in a good waltz," said one.

"What we want is a catchy melody; something that everybody whistles,"
said another.

Finally they were too busy to see Von Barwig at all; and after waiting
hours and hours in vain efforts to obtain an interview, he would walk
home slowly, thinking over the events of the day, or trying to create a
tune that might make an appeal to the music-loving, or rather
music-buying public.

"Alas!" he would say to himself, after giving up the effort.  "I do not
understand these people.  The American people do not like my work."  It
did not occur to him that the Americans were not a music-loving nation,
at least not at that period.  And so Anton Von Barwig gradually came
out of the world of dreams into the world of life.  He had been reborn,
of necessity, for he was nearly down to his last penny.  He used to
talk over the condition of the music market with Tagliafico, our old
friend, Fico, of the hall bedroom on the top floor of Miss Husted's
establishment, and Pinac, Fico's friend, who occupied the room
adjoining.  The meeting of these three men, which subsequently resulted
in a friendship lasting many years, came about as follows:

While eating dinner at Galazatti's one night, Von Barwig found himself
at the same table as Fico.  Fico bowed to him and he graciously
acknowledged his salute, not knowing who the man was, but vaguely
remembering his features.  Fico then introduced Pinac, his
fellow-lodger.  Fico had recognised Von Barwig as the occupant of the
first floor and took this opportunity of making the acquaintance of the
musician whose music he had so often heard on the piano--for Von Barwig
frequently played his own compositions and the strains were wafted
through the open window.  Pinac was most enthusiastic, for he knew Von
Barwig slightly by reputation.  He had been in Dresden and he had heard
of Anton Von Barwig, the musical conductor.  It seemed scarcely
possible that the gentleman before him was that great man.

Von Barwig was silent, smiling a little at Pinac's enthusiasm, but as
he did not deny his identity Pinac felt sure that he was right.  The
three men soon became quite friendly and often met in the little _cafe_
to talk things over.  Galazatti's was frequented chiefly by foreigners
and the din of loud voices added to the rattle and clatter of knives
and forks made conversation difficult.  But its patrons soon became
used to this and the _table d'hote_ was cheap and good at the price,
twenty-five cents.  It was a combination of East Side Tivoli and French
Brasserie and Hungarian Goulash Rendezvous--a tiny cosmopolis in
itself--and it did a rushing business.

So the months dragged along in unending monotony.  Poor Von Barwig
tried hard to do work that would please the gentlemen who controlled
the music trades, but failed.  One day, while looking over his
manuscripts to discover if possible the cause of his failure, he was
struck by the similarity of one of his compositions to another.  They
all seemed to contain the same melody, in one form or another, and he
saw plainly at last that he was subconsciously haunted by the leading
motif of the first movement of his last symphony, the symphony that was
played on that dreadful night for the first and last time.  The
inference was plain enough.  This melody haunted him, he could not
forget it; it showed itself in all his work and he realised that his
career as a composer had come to an end.

After that Von Barwig tore up all his compositions and turned his
attention to teaching, an occupation he had always hated ever since he
had given up the professorship of counterpoint and harmony in the
Leipsic Conservatory.  Teaching--the very thought had made him shudder.
He looked about him and found that New York was fast moving uptown, and
that Houston Street was not a good locality for a musical conservatory.
People who could afford to study music did not live in that
neighbourhood; but he could not summon up sufficient energy or courage
to leave the place.  He had come to like the old house; it had become a
home to him now.  He liked Miss Husted, too, though she made him the
repository for all her troubles, and then there were Fico, and Pinac
and Jenny--he really loved Jenny.  His little world was all in Houston
Street and he made up his mind not to leave it, even if the location
made the getting of pupils harder.  Besides he felt that he was not a
fashionable teacher; he could teach only those who learned music
because they loved it and not because they wanted to be accomplished.

Von Barwig did not speak to his friends of all this; his pride would
not allow him to discuss his personal affairs with them.  Besides
neither Pinac nor Fico could throw much light on the pupil question,
for though they were musicians, yes, for they played, they did not
teach.  Pinac did not even know until Von Barwig showed him how to hold
his violin properly he used to grab it with his whole hand instead of
by his finger and thumb; and as for Fico, he could not read music until
Von Barwig taught him, but played the mandolin, guitar and piano by
ear.  These men were not only grateful to Von Barwig for his kindness,
but they loved him, and recognising in him the real artist had
unbounded respect for him.  As for Von Barwig, he found them simple
fellows, sentimental, unpretentious and good-hearted, and he liked them
and felt at ease with them because they did not seek to probe into that
part of his life which he preferred should remain unknown to them.
They merely accepted him as they found him and for this Von Barwig was
grateful.  As time went on, Von Barwig found himself badly in need of
ready money.  One day when Miss Husted came for her rent, he hesitated
before he paid her; he had forgotten it was rent day and was
unprepared.  The poor lady was kindness itself, but her kindness
embarrassed Von Barwig extremely, for he had never been in a position
in his life where he actually needed cash for his daily wants.

"Leave it a week, a month, a year, my dear professor!" said Miss
Husted, and she implored him not to pay her if it afforded him the
slightest inconvenience.

"I go to the bank--if you come in an hour I will have it for you," said
poor Von Barwig, quite overcome.  He did not know what it was to be
"behind," and the experience was painful to him.

This was the beginning of the end, and the valuable Amati violin soon
went for eight hundred dollars, one-fourth its value, to a scoundrelly
violin maker and dealer who told Von Barwig he had tried everywhere but
could get no more for it, since there was a doubt as to its genuineness.

Von Barwig took the money, which was further decreased by a twenty per
cent. commission.  The man told him he was very lucky to get it; and
perhaps he was.

This amount tided Von Barwig over for several months, during which time
he secured several pupils and seemed for a time to be in a fair way to
make a living.  Be it understood that he was no longer the Anton Von
Barwig who lived in Leipsic ten years before.  Gone was the fire of his
genius; dead was his ambition.  His soul was not in his work--the man
was alive, but the artist was dead.




Chapter Eight

And so the years passed away; one, two, three, Von Barwig did not keep
count now.  One year was just like another, equally profitless, equally
monotonous; the struggle for existence just as keen, the interest in
this or that pupil just as superficial, the interest in obtaining
pupils perhaps the greatest of all.  But the drudgery of teaching the
young mind to distinguish between crotchet and quaver, and mark time,
mark time, wore Von Barwig out.

"Good God," he would think, "will it ever come that time shall cease to
be, and I shall cease to mark it?"  The old man often smiled as he
contrasted the Leipsic days with the present.  Then he had but to raise
his arm and from a hundred instruments and five hundred voices would
vibrate sounds of beauty, of colour, of joy, in harmony and rhythm.
Now when he beat time some dirty-fingered little pupil would tinkle out
sounds that nearly drove him mad with their monotony.  Von Barwig had
been compelled to sell his good piano and rent one on the installment
plan; a cheap tin-pan affair, with a sounding board that sent forth the
most metallic sort of music.  This went on until Von Barwig hated the
very sound of a musical instrument.  He must have suffered terribly,
but he made no mention of it.  At the close of his day's work he would
shut his piano wearily, put away his violin and go to Galazatti's,
where he would meet his friends, Fico and Pinac.  He did not complain,
but they did.  Fico was playing the mandolin on a Coney Island boat;
Pinac was doing nothing, but sat in Galazatti's all day.  When they
complained to Von Barwig of their ill luck, their inability to obtain
good engagements because they could not get into the Musical Union, Von
Barwig did not spare them.  He told them plainly that they had talent
but that they were lazy; they would neither study nor practise, and yet
they expected to enjoy the fruits of labour without its drudgery.  Both
Fico and Pinac felt that he was right, and from that day forward they
did practise and study, with the result that a year or so later they
were admitted into the Union; but times were hard and good regular
engagements were rare.

One day while Von Barwig was labouring hard to beat time and other
musical values into the head of a square-browed, freckle-faced youth of
nineteen, whom nature had ordained for the carpenter's bench and not
for the piano, a knock came at the door, and on invitation to enter, in
came a little fellow not more than nine years of age, black-haired,
dark-eyed, of olive complexion, his features plainly bearing the stamp
of his Hebraic origin.  As he stood at the door trying to speak, Von
Barwig could not help commenting on his finely chiselled features and
the intelligence and fire in his eyes.

"What can I do for you, little man?" inquired Von Barwig.  His soft
voice and kindly look of interest gave the boy courage; for he was
obviously afraid to speak.

"Come to me," said Von Barwig tenderly, and after he had closed the
door, he placed his arm around the boy's neck.  The old man's trained
eye discerned in a moment the sensitive play of the lad's mouth, the
quivering of the nostril that denotes what we call temperament.

"I want to study--I want to learn--and they won't let me," blurted out
the boy, bursting into tears.

"Who won't let you?" gently inquired Von Barwig.

"My people," sobbed the child.

"Hully Gee, you're in luck!" interrupted the shock-headed youth.  "I
wish my people wouldn't let me."

"You go home, Underman!  You have no soul; this child has."

"You bet I will!" and with a dart at his hat, the big boy seized it and
ran out of the door in a moment.

"So you want to study music and they won't let you?"

"Yes, sir.  I--they'll let me play at night, but in the daytime, I--I
must work."

In a short half hour Von Barwig made the discovery that the child was a
musical genius.  He had taken no lessons and yet his manipulation of
the keys was marvellous, but all by ear.  Chords, arpeggios, diminished
sevenths, modulation, expression, all were mixed up in formless melody.
The boy knew nothing, but felt everything.  In Von Barwig's experience
it had generally been the other way.

"Who sent you to me?" asked Von Barwig after he had heard the child
play.

"The sign says that you teach music, and I--I--then I saw your name
outside."  The little fellow seemed to think that he had committed some
crime in coming in unasked.  Von Barwig put him at his ease, then
called in Pinac and Fico, and they listened to the child's playing in
open-mouthed astonishment.  Bit by bit Von Barwig elicited his history
from him.  His name, it appeared, was Josef Branski, and he was the
oldest of seven children.  His father and mother had come from Warsaw,
in Poland, and worked in a sweat shop below Grand Street near the
river.  Josef himself worked there, too, and helped to support his
family, who all lived in three small rooms.  His parents would miss him
and be angry, he said, and this partly accounted for the little
fellow's anxiety.  Von Barwig shook his head; he already had many
pupils who couldn't pay, as well as several who didn't pay, but here
was one who had to steal the time in which to learn his beloved art.
It would be a crime not to teach the boy, he thought, so he determined
to take him as his pupil.

Some six months later an excited Pole bounded into Von Barwig's room
and in a mixture of Polish, German and Hebrew threatened Von Barwig
with the law if he continued to take his son away from him.  He was, as
nearly as Von Barwig could make out, little Josef Branski's father.
Von Barwig vainly endeavoured to explain to the man that the boy could
make his parents rich if they allowed him to study and develop himself
as an artist, but they must give him time to practise, instead of
compelling him to sew at a machine twelve or fourteen hours a day.  The
older Branski either could not or would not understand.  He declared
that he did not want his son to be a worthless musician (for he
evidently associated Von Barwig with the gipsy, an inferior type of
musician) and could not be made to understand that the boy had talent,
even genius.  He needed the boy's help and wanted no further
interference from Von Barwig.  Von Barwig saw that it was useless and
gave up trying to dissuade him from his purpose in condemning the boy
to the merciless grind of a sweat shop machine.  So it was that little
Josef came at night only for his lessons.  This went on for some time,
but Von Barwig shook his head sadly as he saw that the boy was tired
out with his day's work and could not take in the instruction.  Finally
he told Josef that he had better not come again, as the strain of night
study following the grind of machine work during the day was plainly
telling on his health.  But the boy pleaded hard:

"Take away my music and you take away my life," he said.  "Some day
father and mother will see and then they'll let me study with you."

Von Barwig looked at the boy sadly.

"They love me and they want to see me famous, but they don't
understand.  They work so hard, they have so little to eat, and there
are so many of them.  Mother can't work, you know, she has to nurse the
baby.  I must do all I can; I'm the eldest, it's my duty!"

The boy's eyes filled with tears as he thought of the hardships his
parents went through.  "Father worked till twelve o'clock last night;
he's working now," and the little chap looked at the cuckoo clock,
which was just striking ten.

"How long will it be before I can play to the gentlemen you're going to
take me to?" he asked wistfully.

"I think you'd better have a little rest before you play to them,
Josef.  You've been working very hard; up at five, to bed at midnight!"
Von Barwig noticed that Josef's face was peaked and white, but his
great black eyes looked appealingly at his master.

"But I must play to them; they'll give me money and I can give the
money to father.  Then he'll believe me, and he'll believe you," said
the boy in a tearful voice.  His urgent, appealing manner had its
effect on Von Barwig.

"I'll take you to-morrow morning," he said.  "Will your father let you
go?"

"I'll beg him, I'll beg him, oh, so hard, on my bended knees.  He won't
refuse, he can't refuse!  If he does, I--I'll just make an excuse and
leave the machine as if I were going for oil, or cotton or something.
I'll come!  Don't disappoint me, will you?"

And so it was arranged that the boy should call for Von Barwig on the
morrow and that they should go to Steinway Hall, where Josef should
play before some musical gentlemen that Von Barwig had come to know.

The morning arrived, but little Josef did not appear.  After waiting
three hours, Von Barwig made up his mind that the father would not let
the boy go, so he sadly gave up the idea for that day, and waited till
evening for Josef to come as usual for his lesson.  When the child did
not come, Von Barwig experienced again that sensation of fear, for the
first time in several years; and with it came the train of sickening
thought, the old dread of impending evil.  Von Barwig soon threw this
off, and waited for events with as much calmness and patience as he
could muster up.

A week passed, and Miss Husted could not understand why Von Barwig
spoke in such a low tone when he replied to her cheery good-evening.
Mrs. Mangenborn put it down to hard times.  Jenny knew something was
wrong, for he said very little to her as she swept out his room.  She
knew something had happened, but experience had taught her that
sympathy doesn't ask questions.  As for Pinac and Fico, they were too
full of their own affairs to notice anything unless it was brought
directly to their attention, and as Von Barwig made it a rule never to
burden other people with his troubles they were in blissful ignorance
of his mental perturbation.  So it went on till the tenth day, when Von
Barwig made up his mind to go and call on his little pupil and find out
what was the matter.

After much hunting and questioning, Von Barwig found the family he was
looking for on the fourth floor of a crowded tenement house in
Rivington Street.  He heard the whirr of sewing machines and as he
opened the door he saw the father of his pupil, and several others, all
sewing rapidly as if for dear life.  The six machines made such a noise
he could barely hear the sound of his own voice.  As soon as Branski
saw Von Barwig, he jumped up from his machine and railed at him in
terms of bitter reproach.  It was well perhaps that Von Barwig could
not understand and that the noise of the machines and the crying of
babies prevented his hearing what was said.  The father pointed into
the next room and motioned him to go in there.  Pushing aside a little
chintz curtain, for there was no door, Von Barwig saw the object of his
search lying on a cot in the corner of a small inner room with no
window, only an air shaft for light and air, moaning in the grasp of
mortal illness.

The mother sat by the bedside of the sick boy rocking herself slowly,
and at the same time holding a babe to her heart.  The little one was
trying in vain to get sustenance enough to satisfy its pangs of hunger
and crying because it couldn't.  Another child of two years of age was
playing on the floor, banging two pieces of wood together and shouting
gleefully when it succeeded in making a noise.  The woman looked at her
sick son helplessly and then at Von Barwig.

"Doctor?" she asked feebly.

Von Barwig shook his head slowly.  He saw that his little pupil was too
weak to recognise him and gazed at him too moved to speak.  His lips
quivered, and kneeling down by the lad's bedside he wept scalding hot
tears of agony, for he felt rather than knew that the boy was dying.
It appeared from the mother's story that when Josef had reached home
that night he had been in too excited a state to sleep.  All night he
moaned and tossed--the next morning he was delirious.  The prospect of
deliverance from his life of drudgery had been too much for him and had
resulted in brain fever.  The doctor said he had a bad cold, then
finally announced that tubercular complications had set in, and as
nearly as Von Barwig could find out the boy was now rapidly wasting
away with the dreaded white disease.  Von Barwig looked around him
helplessly; the light was bad, the air rank poison and the noise and
commotion distracting.

"What hope could there be for his recovery?" thought Von Barwig, and he
then and there resolved on a plan of action.  Before he left the house
he had given the father all the money he had and secured a room with
plenty of light and air and a nurse for the boy.  His efforts were
crowned with success.  In a few weeks little Josef was gently nursed
back to life, and at the first signs of returning health Von Barwig saw
to it that he was sent South.  "His only chance," the doctor had said.
It was Von Barwig who gave him that chance, but in order to do so he
parted with his last remaining bit of valuable jewelry.

      *      *      *      *      *      *

It was some time before Von Barwig recovered from the effects of
witnessing the sufferings of his pupil.  When Jenny asked him about
Josef Branski he smiled sadly and shook his head.

"The doctor says it may be years before he can touch an instrument
again.  Poor Josef--his little frame completely went to pieces under
the burning fire of his genius; if any one was ever born out of harmony
with his surroundings, he was.  He might have become a great artist,"
added Von Barwig thoughtfully and then he sighed.  It was a great
struggle for him to send the money to keep the little chap alive down
South, but he made the sacrifice without a murmur.  If only the boy
recovered, it would be sufficient reward for all his work.  But it was
not to be, for a few weeks later they brought him the news that his
little pupil had died peacefully, without pain.  Von Barwig said
nothing--his mouth tightened a little and he smiled, a sad, far-away
smile.  Miss Husted tried to cheer him up.  She had learned from Jenny
the details of the affair and her heart went out to the old man in
womanly sympathy.  She had liked the boy, too, and when he came for his
lesson had given him many a slice of cake, for she thought he always
looked pinched and hungry, underfed, as she called it.

"Do come and have a bit of dinner with us, professor," she said.  With
her dinner was a universal panacea, but Von Barwig declined with many
thanks.  He had grown to like Miss Husted and realised that she was
far, far above the average woman of her class.  Moreover, he felt that
she liked him, and sympathy begets sympathy.

"Professor, you are always doing things for folks, but you never allow
folks to do anything for you," said Miss Husted, slightly piqued by his
refusal of her invitation.

"Ah, then I accept!" said Von Barwig, seeing that she was hurt, "just
to show you that you are more powerful than my own resolutions.  But I
warn you I shall be sad company; I don't feel quite myself tonight.  It
is better, far better, that little Josef should have--left us, for I do
not think he would have ever been strong enough to play again, but--"
and Von Barwig sighed, "it is sad enough.  A little light prematurely
snuffed out is always sad.  Ah, well!  I won't make you miserable.
Life is full of sorrow for us all; don't let me selfishly add to yours."

At dinner he was the life of the party.  He pinched Jenny's cheek; he
joked with Miss Husted; he smiled at Thurza, and he even ventured a few
remarks to Mrs. Mangenborn, whom he cordially disliked.  Every one
present thought that Von Barwig was as happy as could be.

That night, after he had closed the door of his room he sighed deeply
and looked out of his window into the street at the blinking
lamplights.  Once more that mournful far-away expression came into his
face and he asked himself: "Why?  Why is it my fate to lose everything
I love?  Have I not yet drunk the dregs of my cup of sorrow?"

      *      *      *      *      *      *

"Good-night, professor," came Miss Husted's cheery voice from the
hallway, interrupting his reverie.

"Good-night, Mr. Von Barwig," said Jenny, as she passed his room on her
way to bed.  He opened the door and kissed her tenderly.

"Good-night, good-night, my friends," said Von Barwig.  The sound of
their voices comforted him not a little and then he thought, "I mustn't
be ungrateful; there are many, many kind hearts in this world."  And he
slept peacefully all that night.




Chapter Nine

The next morning, while Von Barwig was waiting for a pupil--he had very
few in these days--Jenny came into his room with a letter, at the sight
of which his heart beat rapidly, for it was post-marked Germany.  The
handwriting was in a boyish scrawl he did not recognise.

"Not many pupils to-day?" ventured Jenny.

"No, they don't come; I'm afraid this is not just exactly the
neighbourhood.  New York is going uptown.  I gave only fifteen lessons
last week."

"That's not bad, is it?" asked Jenny.

"Not so bad when they pay, but they don't," laughed Von Barwig, and
seeing that his visitor was in no hurry to leave him, Von Barwig
ventured to open his letter and read it.  He read it again and then
looked at Jenny with such a perplexed expression on his face that she
was forced to laugh in spite of herself.

"Young Poons is coming," he said finally.

"Is he?" replied Jenny doubtfully.

"Yes, he is coming.  He is the son of an old friend; a very dear old
friend.  His name is August and he wants me to--to give him a start in
life.  He is a 'cello player.  You know what is a 'cello?  It's a large
violin and stands up when you play it, so," and he took his own violin
and placing it between his knees showed her how the 'cello was
manipulated.

"He sails on the steamship _City of Berlin_.  He is coming here to make
his fortune," and Von Barwig laughed at the idea of making a fortune at
music in America.

"How old is he?" asked Jenny.

"Hum--he must be seventeen by this time!"  Jenny became quite
interested.  "I knew him when he was quite a little chap; his father
was a horn player in my orchestra at--at--" Von Barwig hesitated; "in
Germany.  I must help him.  Yes, Jenny, I must help him.  Poor old
August, I must be a father to his son!  He was a dear little chap," he
said reminiscently.  "Tell your aunt we shall want one of her bedrooms
on the top floor if it is at liberty."

"The one next to Mr. Pinac is empty.  Aunt will be so pleased that a
friend of yours is going to take it."  And Jenny rushed off to acquaint
her aunt with the good news.

Von Barwig told the news of the impending arrival of his friend's son
to Pinac and Fico, and the three men went down to the docks to meet
him.  At the docks they learned that he had arrived with eleven hundred
other steerage passengers and had landed at Castle Garden, so they went
down to the Battery to try and find him.  They found him in an inner
room off the immigrants' reception hall, sitting on an old trunk, and
busily engaged in trying to prevent his 'cello, which was protected
only by a green bag, from being smashed by the rushing, gesticulating
crowd of baggage men, porters and immigrants.  With his round, smiling
face and blond hair he was the picture of his father, and Von Barwig,
recognising him in a moment, embraced him cordially.

"I am to be sent back," he cried in German.

"Nonsense!" said Von Barwig, placing his arm around the young man
affectionately.  After Von Barwig had introduced his friend, they
noticed his crestfallen manner.

"What's the matter?" asked Pinac, who could not understand German, but
who knew something was wrong, and wanted to show Poons that he knew the
ropes in the States.  Poons poured out a tale of woe which was intended
to touch Von Barwig's heart and gain his sympathy, instead of which it
made him laugh heartily.

"Some one is investing his money for him and hasn't come back yet," Von
Barwig confided to his friends; and they laughed too.  Poons could not
understand why the men laughed at his troubles.  The simple German lad
had been swindled out of all his money, two hundred marks, by the
simplest and most transparent of the many methods of swindling, the
confidence game, and the immigration authorities had refused to allow
him to land, as he had no means of subsistence.  Von Barwig had very
little money with him, so he consulted with his friends.  They were
playing in a _cafe_ at night and had a few dollars in their pockets,
which they cheerfully handed to Von Barwig.  Between them they managed
to find the necessary money and Poons was allowed to land.  On the way
uptown the boy was profuse in his gratitude for the money that Von
Barwig had sent to his mother while she lived.  It was she who had
given her son Von Barwig's address and begged him to seek him out in
America and greet him for her.  Poons was greatly astonished at Von
Barwig's appearance and condition, for he had always heard of him as
one of the great conductors of Germany.  He did not understand how Herr
Von Barwig could be so poor, but he accepted the facts as they were and
ceased to ask himself any further questions.

In due course they arrived at Miss Husted's and young Poons, bag and
baggage and 'cello, was shortly afterward ensconced in a hall bedroom
on the top floor of that lady's establishment.  Von Barwig hurried to
his room, locked the door and looked around him.  A little later when
he let himself quietly into the street, he had under his arm, carefully
wrapped up, his cuckoo clock and a couple of pictures.  That night at
Galazatti's, when he handed to Pinac and Fico the money he had borrowed
from them at Castle Garden and paid for the little dinner which he gave
them to celebrate the arrival of Poons in America, they did not suspect
that he had spent the very last dollar he had in the world.

      *      *      *      *      *      *

Young Poons was not a success at first.  He had a good technique and
was a well-grounded musician, but he could not get an engagement suited
to him, as he was not in the Union, and the foolish boy would not play
dance music.  He said he couldn't, and unfortunately the responsibility
for his financial condition rested on Von Barwig.  It was he who was
compelled to make arrangements with Miss Husted and it was a hard blow
to him to have the additional incumbrance, especially when times were
so hard and pupils so scarce.  It may be imagined that Miss Husted did
not take very kindly to the new arrival, who was unable to pay even his
first week's room rent.  Of course she sympathised with his misfortune,
but thought he should have taken care of his money and not have handed
it to the first person who asked for it, so that now he was a pauper.
She discussed this delicate point with Mrs. Mangenborn in the strict
privacy of her room, but Jenny's ears were very sharp and her sympathy
went out to young Poons.  "Poor young man," she thought, "what a pity
that he had been robbed."  That his mother and father were dead added
to the romance, and she felt a sort of a fellow-orphan's interest in
him.  "Poor boy! robbed of his fortune on his arrival in a strange
country; penniless and homeless; can't speak a word of English; as
helpless as a child."  The maternal instinct in the child was aroused,
and his large innocent blue eyes and blond hair made a very strong
appeal to her.  He needed a mother and she determined to be a mother to
him.  So, many a little delicacy was left surreptitiously in his room;
now a box of chocolates, now a slice of cake, or even a few flowers.
When young Poons would thank Miss Husted for these attentions in the
choicest German that lady would turn on him and tell him to mind his
own business, and he would smile and bow deferentially to her, saying,
"Ja, Frau Hooston."

As the weeks went on, the struggle for Von Barwig to pay expenses
became greater and greater.  Poons saw that it was an effort and
determined to sink his pride, so he begged Pinac to help him get
something for him to do; anything, anywhere.  It was a great day for
Poons when Fico announced to him that the proprietor of the _cafe_
where they played had given them permission to bring him and his 'cello
on trial for a week at a salary of six dollars and his supper, at the
end of the night concert.  Jenny was quite proud.  "I told you that Mr.
Poons would succeed," she said joyfully to her aunt.

"Wait," replied Miss Husted, "he's not out of the woods yet."

But she was mistaken, for he held on to his engagement and at the end
of the week was taken on permanently.  This was most fortunate, for by
this time Von Barwig had completely denuded his room of all superfluous
articles of value; even the fine old prints that had adorned his
bedroom went for a mere trifle.  A silver baton that had been given him
by the director of the Gewandhaus was the last thing to go.  It was
quite a wrench to part with it, for it was the last link between Von
Barwig and his musical past.

In the meantime he had lowered his prices for music lessons in the
hopes of increasing the number of his pupils, and at Miss Husted's
suggestion even had a new sign made with large letters in gold-leaf.
But pupils did not come, and Von Barwig felt that he was indeed doomed
to failure.  Everything he touched turned to dross; his one pupil of
promise had died; there was no future, no outlook, no hope, and yet he
did not give up, nor did he speak of his troubles to his friends.  How
he kept Miss Husted paid up she never knew, and yet, punctually every
week, he handed to her the sum of money due her.  When he suggested
taking a smaller room upstairs she offered to lower the price of the
room he was occupying.  This sacrifice the old man would not accept; so
he remained where he was, always hoping, hoping, hoping.  He did not
complain directly to her, but she knew that he was taking in little or
no money.  She blamed him for not being more exacting with those who
were indebted to him, and as a matter of fact had he been able to
collect all that was owing to him he would have been in far better
circumstances; but no one seemed to think he needed money--he had such
a prosperous air.

"What can I do?" said Von Barwig apologetically, when she told him to
sue his delinquent pupils.  "I tell them their course of lessons is
finished and they make no reply, or if they do, it is an excuse or a
promise.  I cannot go to law with them, and if I could, just think what
it would cost for the lawyer!  Besides, they are very poor--these
neighbours of ours.  Music with them is a luxury, not a necessity.
Poor souls, it brings a little joy into their lives!  They struggle so
hard to get higher in the scale of existence; why should I impede their
progress by demanding my pound of flesh?  No, my dear Miss Husted, they
do the best they can; but they are poor."

"And so are you," replied Miss Husted, shaking her curls.

Von Barwig shook his head dubiously.  "I'm afraid--I--I don't put my
heart into my work."  He did not like to tell her he thought the
neighborhood he lived in was partly to blame.

"Who could put soul into a thing like that?" and he pointed to a cheap
violin he had bought to play to his pupils when he taught them.  "Or
that?" and he dropped the lid of his piano to show his contempt for the
tin pan, called by courtesy a concert grand.  Miss Husted looked sad;
the ever-present tear was close at hand and Von Barwig saw it coming.

"But, never mind, my dear Miss Husted; all comes right in the end!
It's all for some good or other.  I can't see it myself, but I know
it's all for my good.  Come!  Cheer up, cheer up!" and he looked at her
with such a beatific smile that she thought for the moment that she was
very unhappy and that he was trying to help her.

"Very well, I will," she said resignedly, allowing herself to be
comforted.

That was one of Von Barwig's individual traits.  No one ever thought of
cheering him up, for no one knew that he suffered, except perhaps
Jenny.  She alone saw through his smile, and felt rather than knew that
it hid a heart torn with suffering and emotion.

A few days after this Von Barwig read in one of the papers that a man
named Van Praag, whom he knew years before in Berlin as a ticket-taker
in one of the theatres, was going to give a series of concerts in one
of the large concert halls in New York.  He mustered up courage to go
and see him.  Van Praag received him cordially and invited him to
dinner that evening at one of the big hotels.  Von Barwig put on his
old dress suit, and Houston Mansion quickly recognised the fact.  Miss
Husted especially was most enthusiastic.

"Oh, professor, how well you look!" she cried.  "Mrs. Mangenborn, do
come and see the professor with his evening clothes on, he looks a
perfect picture!"

Von Barwig was compelled to leave an hour before the time appointed for
the dinner, in order to escape from the congratulations of his friends.
That night, for the first time in his life, he begged for a position.
He had failed at composing, at teaching, at playing, but surely he
could still conduct an orchestra.  The desire for success grew on him
again.  Van Praag seemed convinced, and at the end of the dinner, after
taking his address, he promised Von Barwig he would do what he could;
but he must consult the director first, etc., etc.

Von Barwig went home that night almost happy.  A pint of champagne at
dinner, with a liqueur afterward, had completely aroused his spirit;
and for the first time in many years he felt quite jovial.  He went to
bed but couldn't go to sleep, so he rose and awakened Pinac and Fico
out of their slumbers to tell them the good news, adding that he
intended to engage them for his orchestra.  Poons, hearing the sound of
voices in the room next to his, came in, and the men sat talking over
their prospects.  Their hopes, their ambitions were about to be
realised, and they talked and smoked the cigars Von Barwig had brought
home with him until sleep was out of the question; they were too
excited to go to bed again.  Twice did Miss Husted send up to beg them
to make less noise, as the second floor front, Mrs. Mangenborn, had
complained that her slumbers were being rudely disturbed.  So the men
dressed themselves and went down into Von Barwig's rooms, where they
sat till daylight, talking and smoking; after which they all went out
to breakfast at Galazatti's.

As the weeks went by and Von Barwig received no word from Van Praag the
certainty of the engagement died out and became merely a hope.  Finally
Von Barwig came to the conclusion that Van Praag had forgotten, and
wrote to him reminding him of his promise.  He received no answer to
his letter, and even the hope of getting the engagement died out some
few months after its birth.




Chapter Ten

The winter had now fairly set in and it was remembered by New Yorkers
as the hardest in many years.  Miss Husted declared it was the coldest
in her experience, for the plumber's presence was constantly required
to thaw out the frozen pipes.  Certainly Von Barwig remembered it
because he had to wrap blankets around him to keep warm while he was
copying music at a few cents a page.  He had other uses for the money
that coal would cost; besides it was very expensive.  So he preferred
to write in bed rather than spend money for fuel, until one day some
sixty odd pages of music were returned to him, because they were so
badly written as to be almost illegible.  The fact is, the old man's
hands trembled so with the cold that he could not hold his pen tightly.
After this loss he gave up copying music, and so even this last meagre
means of getting money was denied him.

As he walked up and down his room, feeling intuitively that it was
breakfast time, he became really angry with himself for his repeated
failures.  Lately he had been thinking of his wife and child; but
fourteen years had somewhat benumbed his memory.  When he thought of
the happiness of his life with them, it was more as a happy dream that
he delighted to ponder over than a tangible something of which he had
been robbed.  The wound was there but the pain had ceased.

"Are you coming out to breakfast?" said Pinac's voice outside.

"Come on, Anton," shouted Fico, "it's late!"

"I've had my breakfast," said Von Barwig, and he felt that he was lying
in a good cause.  The men would have torn down the door and carried him
over to the restaurant by main force had they guessed the truth.
"Thank God it hasn't come to that," he thought.

"He is an early bird," commented Pinac, and he went out humming the
latest music-hall ditty which he was playing nightly to the patrons of
the _cafe_.  Poons went along; he had no more idea of his benefactor's
condition than the man in the moon.  The three men had not seen much of
him lately, for they always left him to himself when he signified by
his silence that he wanted to be alone.  They respected his dignity,
his slightest suggestion was law to them; they loved him, so they left
him alone.

"Come on, you wretch," said Von Barwig to his violin, after the men had
gone, "you are the last of the Mohicans!" and, polishing it, he put it
in its case, having determined to sell it.

"This will be the first meal with which you have provided me," he said,
shaking his fist at it, "so at last you are going to accomplish
something, you cheap wooden cigar-box of a fiddle!  I cannot play you
to advantage but I can eat you.  That's all you are good for--a few
dinners and breakfasts!"  He went out into the street with the violin
under his cloak, and from Houston Street he turned into the Bowery.
There was no elevated road at that time and the thundering,
ear-splitting, overhead noises heard nowadays were not yet in
existence.  Still it was noisy, a perfect bedlam of jabbering
foreigners, who crowded this busiest of busy streets as they crowded no
other section of this cosmopolitan city.  Von Barwig, usually so
sensitive to noises, apparently did not notice this babel.  Curiously
enough his thoughts were miles away from New York, and the idea that he
was going to sell his violin to buy a breakfast was not borne in upon
him with sufficient force to prevent his thinking of something else.
Although it was very cold he did not notice the weather, so he did not
walk fast.  His progress was a mechanical movement, for in fancy he was
in Leipsic again, walking down the August Platz.  It