No, never I shall be won by the graces of a young page with tawny eyelashes, nor by the refined softness and subtlety of any art whatever. Strength alone can win me. As the cat carries off its little ones in its jaws, so let Him carry me away; and whithersoever he may take me, thither I shall go.
When we entered the concert-hall, it was already full. Gina was looking like a ghost.
We saw a good many people we knew, and several gentlemen came to present their respects. They were rather surprised to see Gina there, looked at her not without some tender interest, and seemed to scent a quarry.
Czolhanski, who as representative of his paper was sitting in the first row, also perceived us.
“Where is Mr. Witold?” he asked, looking round the hall. “I have been waiting for him, but he does not come.”
“Unfortunately,” I answered in a rather dry tone, “I am not in a position to enlighten you. However, if he has made an appointment with you, he may be expected to come.”
In reality, however, I was quite sure that Witold would be absent. He had even advised me not to go to the concert, for he particularly wished me to be at home and with him. But I would not disappoint Gina.
“He has promised to be here for sure,” repeated Czolhanski, as he went away.
I soon perceived Owinski walking up the central passage by the side of a lady in black attire, and no longer young. He was holding some tickets and endeavouring (in vain, shortsighted as he was) to find the corresponding numbers of the chairs. A pretty girl walked by the side of the lady in black; her dark eyes sparkled, and she was evidently much impressed by the important nature of the present performance. She spoke in a low tone to her fiancé, seeming to banter him on his embarrassment, and found the seats herself. They sat down at no great distance from us, on the farther side of the central passage.
Owinski left the ladies by themselves, and was returning to seek for something or other, when he happened to perceive us, as he passed by.
He changed colour slightly, and then approached to present his respects, kissing Gina’s hand in silence. She, too, neither spoke a word nor lifted her eyes.
I congratulated him on having got so first-rate an artiste as Ileska to recite his poem; he answered in a few polite words, and withdrew.
There was a pause.
From his shapely tapering fingers, a tall young musician shook some heavy drops of mingled sounds, then sprinkled them about, and they grew ever more and more beautiful; now daintily rounded off—musical pearls, as it were—now broken and hard and angular like stones. Now thunder was heard; the hail pattered and rattled; and someone set up a low murmured wailing, and Gina hung down her head; then sunrise was triumphantly ushered in to the pealing of bells. And the slender artist in black evening dress went on, as before, slowly, drowsily, letting his blossom-like hands fall dropping upon the piano keys, soft as velvet under their touch, and suddenly, with a gesture too rapid to be seen, he shed a perfect shower of pearls round us, from the inexhaustible treasury of his kingly munificence.
Never yet have I at any concert been able to fall under the spell of music.
I listen, and I look. I may even feel dazzled. But, to be spellbound! That requires seclusion, concentration. … There are times when I prefer a barrel-organ to a concert!
I coldly admired the astonishing technique of the young virtuoso, now playing in public for the first time, and the extraordinary charm he possessed, which was like hypnotism or magic. Gina sat enthralled and following each motion of his hands. She no longer cast any glances in the direction of her victorious rival; but sombre clouds were passing over her face, and she knit her golden brows and frowned heavily.
I glanced towards Owinski; but on the way my glance and a look from two black and most observant eyes crossed each other. So! She was scrutinizing Gina!
Silence came; and then a clapping of hands: the first-rate actress, who was thin and unattractive, had appeared upon the platform. She bent her head slightly in a formal bow, and looked round the hall from under gloomy brows. The audience waited, expectant and agitated.
A clear, distinct, cold voice was heard vibrating through the brilliantly lighted hall.
Then, as if preparing for a surprise, it gradually grew mysterious, soft, and low. You thought of marble terraces, leading to subterranean vaults. The words seemed to take a sculptured form from her diction and utterance; their tones went lower, lower, lower still, became the muttering of a hushed lamentation, the rumbling sounds of a scarce audible curse, and the profoundest depths of the agony of death.
At intervals, Ileska would pause to cast her eyes down, and—in an ecstatic concentration of self-suggested rapture—wait while her wonderful voice, reverberated from the white and lofty walls, would echo back and fill her attentive ears. …
And then she would again open her great sombre eyes, and continue her recitation, inspired as it were by the sound of that strange voice of hers.
Indeed, she gave so much of her own special individuality to the poem she was so admirably reciting, that I did not at first recognize it as the work of Owinski. Gina, wrung with anguish, cast up her eyes and threw back her head, looking steadfastly into the glare of the electric candelabra, and blinking now and then, while a couple of tears were sparkling in each outer corner of her eyes. She was trying to force them back into her heart by that means. Ah, yes; I know that trick, I do, how well! … But it was unsuccessful: indeed, it does fail from time to time. Once two translucent pearls trickled slowly on to her temples, and were lost in the tresses of her brown hair.
After
