I don"t feel so complimented as you expect. You see I did have a professional training.
MENDEL [_Smiling_]
And I thought you came to _me_ for lessons!
[_DAVID laughs._]
VERA [_Smiling_]
No, I went to Petersburg----
DAVID [_Dazed_]
To Petersburg----?
VERA [_Smiling_]
Naturally. To the Conservatoire. There wasn"t much music to be had at Kishineff, a town where----
DAVID Kishineff!
[_He begins to tremble._]
VERA [_Still smiling_]
My birthplace.
MENDEL [_Coming toward him, protectingly_]
Calm yourself, David.
DAVID Yes, yes--so you are a Russian!
[_He shudders violently, staggers._]
VERA [_Alarmed_]
You are ill!
DAVID It is nothing, I--not much music at Kishineff! No, only the Death-March!... Mother! Father! Ah--cowards, murderers! And you!
[_He shakes his fist at the air._]
You, looking on with your cold butcher"s face! O G.o.d! O G.o.d!
[_He bursts into hysterical sobs and runs, shamefacedly, through the door to his room._]
VERA [_Wildly_]
What have I said? What have I done?
MENDEL Oh, I was afraid of this, I was afraid of this.
FRAU QUIXANO [_Who has fallen asleep over her book, wakes as if with a sense of the horror and gazes dazedly around, adding to the thrillingness of the moment_]
_Dovidel! Wu is" Dovidel! Mir dacht sach_----
MENDEL [_Pressing her back to her slumbers_]
_Du traumst, Mutter! Schlaf!_ [_She sinks back to sleep._]
VERA [_In hoa.r.s.e whisper_]
His father and mother were ma.s.sacred?
MENDEL [_In same tense tone_]
Before his eyes--father, mother, sisters, down to the youngest babe, whose skull was battered in by a hooligan"s heel.
VERA How did _he_ escape?
MENDEL He was shot in the shoulder, and fell unconscious. As he wasn"t a girl, the hooligans left him for dead and hurried to fresh sport.
VERA Terrible! Terrible!
[_Almost in tears._]
MENDEL [_Shrugging shoulders, hopelessly_]
It is only Jewish history!... David belongs to the species of _pogrom_ orphan--they arrive in the States by almost every ship.
VERA Poor boy! Poor boy! And he looked so happy!
[_She half sobs._]
MENDEL So he is, most of the time--a sunbeam took human shape when he was born.
But naturally that dreadful scene left a scar on his brain, as the bullet left a scar on his shoulder, and he is always liable to see red when Kishineff is mentioned.
VERA I will never mention my miserable birthplace to him again.
MENDEL But you see every few months the newspapers tell us of another _pogrom_, and then he screams out against what he calls that butcher"s face, so that I tremble for his reason. I tremble even when I see him writing that crazy music about America, for it only means he is brooding over the difference between America and Russia.
VERA But perhaps--perhaps--all the terrible memory will pa.s.s peacefully away in his music.
MENDEL There will always be the scar on his shoulder to remind him--whenever the wound twinges, it brings up these terrible faces and visions.
VERA Is it on his right shoulder?
MENDEL No--on his left. For a violinist that is even worse.
VERA Ah, of course--the weight and the fingering.
[_Subconsciously placing and fingering an imaginary violin._]
MENDEL That is why I fear so for his future--he will never be strong enough for the feats of bravura that the public demands.
VERA The wild beasts! I feel more ashamed of my country than ever. But there"s his symphony.
MENDEL And who will look at that amateurish stuff? He knows so little of harmony and counterpoint--he breaks all the rules. I"ve tried to give him a few pointers--but he ought to have gone to Germany.
VERA Perhaps it"s not too late.
MENDEL [_Pa.s.sionately_]
Ah, if you and your friends could help him! See--I"m begging after all.
But it"s not for myself.
VERA My father loves music. Perhaps _he_--but no! he lives in Kishineff. But I will think--there are people here--I will write to you.
MENDEL [_Fervently_]
Thank you! Thank you!