"While I was listening--" I began.
"Oh!" he broke in impulsively, violently, "it isn"t you that have to listen. It"s I that have to listen. It"s the player that has to listen.
He"s got to do more than listen. He"s got to be _in_ the piano with his inmost heart. If he isn"t on the full stretch of a.n.a.lysis the whole blessed time, he might just as well be turning the handle of a barrel-organ."
He always talked about his work during the little "recess" which he took in the middle of the morning. He pretended to be talking to me, but it was to himself that he talked. He was impatient if I spoke.
"I shall be greater than ever," he proceeded, after a moment. And his att.i.tude towards himself was so disengaged, so apart and aloof, so critically appreciative, that it was impossible to accuse him of egoism.
He was, perhaps, as amazed at his own transcendent gift as any other person could be, and he was incapable of hiding his sensations. "Yes," he repeated; "I think I shall be greater than ever. You see, a Chopin player is born; you can"t make him. With Chopin it"s not a question of intellect. It"s all tone with Chopin--_tone_, my child, even in the most bravura pa.s.sages. You"ve got to get it."
"Yes," I agreed.
He gazed over the tree-tops into the blue sky.
"I may be ready in six months," he said.
"I think you will," I concurred, with a judicial air. But I honestly deemed him to be more than ready then.
Twelve months previously he had said: "With six hours" practice a day for two years I shall recover what I have lost."
He had succeeded beyond his hopes.
"Are you writing in that book?" he inquired carelessly as he threw down the cigarette and turned away.
"I have just finished something," I replied.
"Oh!" he said, "I"m glad you aren"t idle. It"s so boring."
He returned to the piano, perfectly incurious about what I did, self-absorbed as a G.o.d. And I was alone in the garden, with the semicircle of trees behind me, and the facade of the old house and its terrace in front. And lying on the lawn, just under the terrace, was the white end of the cigarette which he had abandoned; it breathed upwards a thin spiral of blue smoke through the morning sunshine, and then it ceased to breathe. And the music recommenced, on a different plane, more brilliantly than before. It was as though, till then, he had been laboriously building the bases of a tremendous triumphal arch, and that now the two wings met, dazzlingly, soaringly, in highest heaven, and the completed arch became a rainbow glittering in the face of the infinite. He played two of his great concert pieces, and their intricate melodies--brocaded, embroidered, festooned--poured themselves through the windows into the garden in a procession majestic and impa.s.sioned, perturbing the intent soul of the solitary listener, swathing her in intoxicating sound. It was the unique virtuoso born again, proudly displaying the ultimate sublime end of all those slow-moving exercises to which he had subdued his fingers. Not for ten years had I heard him play so.
When we first came into the house I had said bravely to myself: "His presence shall not deter me from practising as I have always done." And one afternoon I had sat down to the piano full of determination to practise without fear of him, without self-consciousness. But before my hands had touched the keys shame took me, unreasoning, terror-struck shame, and I knew in an instant that while he lived I should never more play the piano. He laughed lightly when I told him, and I called myself silly. Yet now, as I sat in the garden, I saw how right I had been. And I wondered that I should ever have had the audacity even to dream of playing in his house; the idea was grotesque. And he did not ask me to play, save when there arrived new orchestral music arranged for four hands. Then I steeled myself to the ordeal of playing with him, because he wished to try over the music. And he would thank me, and say that pianoforte duets were always very enjoyable. But he did not pretend that I was not an amateur, and he never--thank G.o.d!--suggested that we should attempt _Tristan_ again....
At last he finished. And I heard distantly the bell which he had rung for his gla.s.s of milk. And, remembering that I was not ready for the ride, I ran with guilty haste into the house and upstairs.
The two bay horses were waiting, our English groom at their heads, when I came out to the porch. Diaz was impatiently tapping his boot with his whip. He was not in the least a sporting man, but he loved the sensation of riding, and the groom would admit that he rode pa.s.sably; but he loved more to strut in breeches, and to imitate in little ways the sporting man. I had learnt to ride in order to please him.
"Come along," he exclaimed.
His eyes said: "You are always late." And I was. Some people always know exactly what point they have reached in the maze and jungle of the day, just as mariners are always aware, at the back of their minds, of the state of the tide. But I was not born so.
Diaz helped me to mount, and we departed, jingling through the gate and across the road into a glade of the forest, one of those long sandy defiles, banked on either side, and over-shadowed with tall oaks, which pierce the immense forest like rapiers. The sunshine slanted through the crimsoning leafwork and made irregular golden patches on the dark sand to the furthest limit of the perspective. And though we could not feel the autumn wind, we could hear it in the tree-tops, and it had the sound of the sea. The sense of well-being and of joy was exquisite. The beauty of horses, timid creatures, sensitive and graceful and irrational as young girls, is a thing apart; and what is strange is that their vast strength does not seem incongruous with it. To be above that proud and lovely organism, listening, apprehensive, palpitating, nervous far beyond the human, to feel one"s self almost part of it by intimate contact, to yield to it, and make it yield, to draw from it into one"s self some of its exultant vitality--in a word, to ride--yes, I could comprehend Diaz" fine enthusiasm for that! I could share it when he was content to let the horses amble with noiseless hoofs over the soft ways. But when he would gallop, and a strong wind sprang up to meet our faces, and the earth shook and thundered, and the trunks of the trees raced past us, then I was afraid. My fancy always saw him senseless at the foot of a tree while his horse calmly cropped the short gra.s.s at the sides of the path, or with his precious hand twisted and maimed! And I was in agony till he reined in. I never dared to speak to him of this fear, nor even hint to him that the joy was worth less than the peril. He would have been angry in his heart, and something in him stronger than himself would have forced him to increase the risks. I knew him! ... Ah! but when we went gently, life seemed to be ideal for me, impossibly perfect! It seemed to contain all that I could ever have demanded of it.
I looked at him sideways, so n.o.ble and sane and self-controlled. And the days in Paris had receded, far and dim and phantom-like. Was it conceivable that they had once been real, and that we had lived through them? And was this Diaz, the world-renowned darling of capitals, riding by me, a woman whom he had met by fantastic chance? Had he really hidden himself in my arms from the cruel stare of the world and the insufferable curiosity of admirers who, instead of admiring, had begun to pity? Had I in truth saved him? Was it I who would restore him to his glory? Oh, the astounding romance that my life had been! And he was with me! He shared my life, and I his! I wondered what would happen when he returned to his bright kingdom. I was selfish enough to wish that he might never return to his kingdom, and that we might ride and ride for ever in the forest.
And then we came to a circular clearing, with an iron cross in the middle, where roads met, a place such as occurs magically in some ballade of Chopin"s. And here we drew rein on the leaf-strewn gra.s.s, breathing quickly, with reddened cheeks, and the horses nosed each other, with long stretchings of the neck and rattling of bits.
"So you"ve been writing again?" said Diaz, smiling quizzically.
"Yes," I answered. "I"ve been writing a long time, but I haven"t let _you_ know anything about it; and just to-day I"ve finished it."
"What is it--another novel?"
"No; a little drama in verse."
"Going to publish it?"
"Why, naturally."
Diaz was aware that I enjoyed fame in England and America. He was probably aware that my books had brought me a considerable amount of money. He had read some of my works, and found them excellent--indeed, he was quite proud of my talent. But he did not, he could not, take altogether seriously either my talent or my fame. I knew that he always regarded me as a child gracefully playing at a career. For him there was only one sort of fame; all the other sorts were shadows. A supreme violinist might, perhaps, approach the real thing, in his generous mind; but he was incapable of honestly believing that any fame compared with that of a pianist. The other fames were very well, but they were paste to the precious stone, gewgaws to amuse simple persons. The sums paid to sopranos struck him as merely ridiculous in their enormity. He could not be called conceited; nevertheless, he was magnificently sure that he had been, and still was, the most celebrated person in the civilized world.
Certainly he had no superiors in fame, but he would not admit the possibility of equals. Of course, he never argued such a point; it was a tacit a.s.sumption, secure from argument. And with that he profoundly reverenced the great composers. The death of Brahms affected him for years. He regarded it as an occasion for universal sorrow. Had Brahms condescended to play the piano, Diaz would have turned the pages for him, and deemed himself honoured--him whom queens had flattered!
"Did you imagine," I began to tease him, after a pause, "that while you are working I spend my time in merely existing?"
"You exist--that is enough, my darling," he said. "Strange that a beautiful woman can"t understand that in existing she is doing her life"s work!"
And he leaned over and touched my right wrist below the glove.
"You dear thing!" I murmured, smiling. "How foolish you can be!"
"What"s the drama about?" he asked.
"About La Valliere," I said.
"La Valliere! But that"s the kind of subject I want for my opera!"
"Yes," I said; "I have thought so."
"Could you turn it into a libretto, my child?"
"No, dearest."
"Why not?"
"Because it already is a libretto. I have written it as such."
"For me?"
"For whom else?"
And I looked at him fondly, and I think tears came to my eyes.
"You are a genius, Magda!" he exclaimed. "You leave nothing undone for me. The subject is the very thing to suit Villedo."
"Who is Villedo?"
"My jewel, you don"t know who Villedo is! Villedo is the director of the Opera Comique in Paris, the most artistic opera-house in Europe. He used to beg me every time we met to write him an opera."
"And why didn"t you?"
"Because I had neither the subject nor the time. One doesn"t write operas after lunch in hotel parlours; and as for a good libretto--well, outside Wagner, there"s only one opera in the world with a good libretto, and that"s _Carmen_."