CHAPTER XXI
THE VIOLIN
While Amalia lay recovering from the sprained ankle, which proved to be a serious hurt, Madam Manovska continued to improve. She took up the duties which had before occupied Amalia only, and seemed to grow more cheerful. Still she remained convinced that Larry Kildene would return with her husband, and her daughter’s anxiety as to what might be the outcome, when the big man should arrive alone, deepened.
Harry King guardedly and tenderly watched over the two women. Every day he carried Amalia out in the sun to a sheltered place, where she might sit and work at the fascinating lace with which her fingers seemed to be only playing, yet which developed into webs of most intricate design, even while her eyes were not fixed upon it, but were glancing about at whatever interested her, or up in his face, as she talked to him impulsively in her fluent, inverted English.
Amalia was not guarded; she was lavish with her interest in all he said, and in her quick, responsive, and poetic play of fancy–ardent and glowing–glad to give out from her soul its best to this man who had befriended her father in their utmost need and who had saved her own and her mother’s life. She knew always when a cloud gathered over his spirit, and made it her duty to dispel such mists of some possible sad memory by turning his thoughts to whatever of beauty she found around them, or in the inspiration of her own rich nature.
To avoid disquieting her by the studied guardedness of his manner, Harry employed himself as much of the time as possible away from the cabin, often in providing game for the winter. Larry Kildene had instructed him how to cure and dry the meat and to store it and also how to care for the skins, but because of the effect of that sight of the bloody sheep’s pelt on Amalia, he never showed her a poor little dead creature, or the skin of one. He brought her mother whatever they required of food, carefully prepared, and that was all.
He constructed a chair for her and threw over it furs from Larry Kildene’s store, making it soft and comfortable thereby. He made also a footstool for the hurt ankle to rest upon, and found a beautiful lynx skin with which to cover her feet. The back of the chair he made high, and hinged it with leather to the seat, arranging it so that by means of pegs it might be raised or lowered. Without lumber, and with the most simple tools, he sawed and hewed the logs, and lacking nails he set it together with pegs, but what matter? It was comfortable, and in the making of it he eased his heart by expressing his love without sorrowful betrayal.
Amalia laughed as she sat in it, one day, close to the open door, because the air was too pinching cold for her to be out. She laughed as she put her hands in the soft fur and drew her fingers through it, and looked up in Harry’s face.
“You are thinking me so foolish, yes, to have about me the skins of poor little killed beasts? Yet I weeped all those tears on your coat because to see the other–yes,–hanging beside the door. It is so we are–is not?”
“I’m glad enough you’re not consistent. It would be a blot on your character.”
“But for why, Mr. ’Arry?”
“Oh, I couldn’t stand it.”
Again she laughed. “How it is very peculiar–that reason you give. Not to stand it! Could you then to sit it?” But Harry only laughed and looked away from her. She laid her face against the soft fur. “Good little animals–to give me your life. But some time you would die–perhaps with sorrow of hunger and age, and the life be for nothing. This is better.”
“There you’re right. Let me draw you back in the room and close the door. It will freeze to-night, I’m thinking.”
“Oh, not yet, please! I have yet to see the gloryful sky of the west. Last evening how it was beautiful! To-night it will be more lovely to look upon for the long line of little cloud there on which the red of the sun will burn like fire in the heaven over the mountain.”
“You must enjoy the beauty, Amalia, and then pray that there may be no snow. It looks like it, and we want the snow to hold off until Larry comes back.”
“We pray, always, my mamma and I. She that he come back quickly, and me–I pray that he come back safely–but to be soon–it is such terror to me.”
“Larry will find a way out of the difficulty. He will have an excuse all thought out for your mother. I am more anxious about the snow with a sunset sky like that, but I don’t know anything about this region.”
“Mr. ’Arry, so very clever you are in making things, can you help me to one more thing? I like very much to have the sticks for lame walking,–what you call–the crutch? Yes. I have for so long time spoken only the Polish that I forget me greatly the English. You must talk to me much, and make me reproof of my mistakes. Do you know for why I like the crutch? It is that I would go each day–many times to see the water fall down. Ah, how that is beautiful! In the sun, or early in the morning, or in the night, always beautiful!”
“You shall have the crutches, Amalia, and until I get them made, I will carry you to the fall each day. Come, I will take you there now. I will wrap these furs around you, and you shall see the fall in the evening light.”
“No, ’Arry King. To-morrow I will try to ride on the horse if you will lift me up on him. I will let you do this. But you may not carry me as you have done. I am now so strong. You may make me the crutch, yes.” Of all things he wished her to let him carry her to the fall, but her refusal was final, and he set about making the crutches immediately.
Through the evening he worked on them, and at nightfall the next day he brought them to her. As he came down from his shed, carrying the crutches proudly, he heard sweet, quavering tones in the air wafted intermittently. The wind was still, and through the evening hush the tones strengthened as he drew nearer the cabin, until they seemed to wrap him in a net of interwoven cadences and fine-spun threads of quivering melody–a net of sound, inclosing his spirit in its intricate mesh of sweetness.
He paused and breathed deeply, and turned this way and that, as if he would escape but found no way; then he walked slowly on. At the door of the cabin he paused again. The firelight shone through from underneath, and a fine thread of golden light sifted through the latch of the door and fell on the hand that held Amalia’s crutches. He looked down on the spot of light dancing over his hand as if he were dazed by it. Very gently he laid the crutches across the threshold, and for a long time stood without, listening, his head bowed as if he were praying.
It was her father’s violin, the one she had wept at leaving behind her. What was she playing? Strange, old-world melodies they seemed, tossed into the air, now laughing, now wailing like sorrowing women voices. Oh, the violin in her hands! Oh, the rapture of hearing it, as her soul vibrated through it and called to him–called to him!–But he would not hear the call. He turned sorrowfully and went down again to the shed and there he lay upon his face and clasped his hands above his head and whispered her name. It was as if his heart were beating itself against prison walls and the clasped hands were stained with blood.
He rose next morning, haggard and pale. The snow was falling–falling–softly and silently. It fell like lead upon his heart, so full of anxiety was he for the good friend who might even then be climbing up the trail. Madam Manovska observed his drawn face, and thought he suffered only from anxiety and tried to comfort him. Amalia also attempted to cover her own anxiety by assurances that the good St. Christopher who watches over travelers would protect Larry Kildene, because he knew so well how many dangers there were, and that he, who had carried the Christ with all his burden of sorrows could surely keep “Sir Kildene” even through the snows of winter. In spite of an inherent and trained disbelief in all supposed legends, especially as tenets of faith, Harry felt himself comforted by her talk, yet he could not forbear questioning her as to her own faith in them.
“Do you truly believe all that, Amalia?”
“All–that–? Of what–Mr. ’Arry?” She seemed truly mystified.
“I mean those childish legends of the saints you often quote?”
Amalia laughed. “You think I have learn them of the good sisters in my convent, and is no truth in them?”
“Why–I guess that’s about it. Did your father believe them?”
“Maybe no. But my father was ‘devoué’–very–but he had a very wide thought of God and man–a thought reaching far out–to–I find it very hard to explain. If but you understood the French, I could tell you–but for me, I have my father’s faith and it makes me glad to play in my heart with these legends–as you call them.”
He gave her a quick, appealing glance, then turned his gaze away. “Try to explain. Your English is beautiful.”
“If you eat your breakfast, then will I try.”
“Yes, yes, I will. You say he had faith reaching far out–to where–to what?”
“He said there would never be rest in all the universe until we find everywhere God,–living–creating–moving forever in the–the–all.” She held out her hands and extended her arms in an encompassing movement indescribably full of grace.
“You mean he was a pantheist?”
“Oh, no, no. That is to you a horror, I see, but it was not that.” She laughed again, so merrily that Harry laughed, too. But still he persisted, “Amalia–never mind what your father thought; tell me your own faith.”
Then she grew grave, “My faith is–just–God. In the all. Seeing–feeling–knowing–with us–for us–never away–in the deep night of sorrow–understanding. In the far wilderness–hearing. In the terror and remorse of the heart–when we weep for sin–loving. It is only one thing in all the world to learn, and that is to learn all things, just to reach out the mind, and touch God–to find his love in the heart and so always live in the perfect music of God. That is the wonderful harmony–and melody–and growth–of each little soul–and of all peoples, all worlds,–Oh, it is the universe of love God gives to us.”
For a while they were silent, and Madam Manovska began to move about the cabin, setting the things in order. She did not seem to have taken any interest in their talk. Harry rose to go, but first he looked in Amalia’s eyes.
“The perfect Music of God?” He said the words slowly and questioningly.
“You understand my meaning?”
“I can’t say. Do you?”
She quickly snatched up her violin which lay within reach of her arm. “I can better show you.” She drew a long chord, then from it wandered into a melody, sweet and delicate; then she drew other chords, and on into other melodies, all related; then she began to talk again. “It is only on two strings I am playing–for hear? the others are now souls out of the music of God–listen–” she drew her bow across the discordant strings. “How that is terrible! So God creates great and beautiful laws–” she went back into the harmony and perfect melody, and played on, now changing to the discordant strain, and back, as she talked–“and gives to all people power to understand, but not through weakness–but through longing and searching with big earnestness of purpose, and much desire. Who has no care and desire for the music of God, strikes always those wrong notes, and all suffer as our ears suffer with the bad sounds. So it is, through long desiring, and living, always a little and a little more perceiving, reaching out the hand to touch in love our brothers and sisters on the earth,–always with patience learning to find in our own souls the note that strikes in harmony with the great thought of God–and thus we understand and live in the music of God. Ah, it is hard for me to say it–but it is as if our souls are given wings–wings–that reach–from the gold of the sun–even to the earth at our feet, and we float upon that great harmony of love like upon a wonderful upbearing sea, and never can we sink, and ever all is well–for we live in the thought of God.”
“Amalia–Amalia–How about sin, and the one who–kills–and the ones who hate–and the little children brought into the world in sin–” Harry’s voice trembled, and he bowed his head in his hands.
“Never is anything lost. They are the ones who have not yet learned–they have not found the key to God’s music. Those who find must quickly help and give and teach the little children–the little children find so easily the key–but to all the strings making horrible discord on the earth–we dare not shut our ears and hide–so do the sweet, good sisters in the convent. They do their little to teach the little children, but it is always to shut their ears. But the Christ went out in the world, not with hands over his ears, but outreached to his brothers and sisters on the earth. But my father–my father! He turned away from the church, because he saw they had not found the true key to God’s music–or I mean they kept it always hid, and covered with much–how shall I say–with much drapery–and golden coverings, that the truth–that is the key–was lost to sight. It was for this my father quarreled with–all that he thought not the truth. He believed to set his people free both from the world’s oppression and from their own ignorance, and give to them a truth uncovered. Oh, it set his old friends in great discord more than ever–for they could not make thus God’s music. And so they rose up and threw him in prison, and all the terrible things came upon him–of the world. My mother must have been very able through love to drag him free from them, even if they did pursue. It was the conflict of discord he felt all his life, and now he is free.”
Suddenly the mother’s deep tones sounded through the cabin with a finality that made them both start. “Yes. Now he is free–and yet will he bring them to–know. We wait for him here. No more must he go to Poland. It is not the will of God.”
Still Harry was not satisfied. “But if you think all these great thoughts–and you do–I can’t see how you can quote those legends as if you thought them true.”
“I quote them, yes, because I love them, and their poetry. Through all beauty–all sweetness–all strength–God brings to us his thought. This I believe. I believe the saints lived and were holy and good, loving the great brotherhood. Why may not they be given the work of love still to do? It is all in the music of God, that they live, and make happy, and why should I believe that it is now taken from them to do good? Much that I think lies deep in my heart, and I cannot tell it in words.”
“Nor can I. But my thoughts–” For an instant Amalia, looking at him, saw in his face the same look of inward fear–or rather of despair that had appalled Larry, but it went as quickly as it appeared, and she wondered afterward if she had really seen it, or if it was a strange trick of the firelight in the windowless cabin.
“And your thoughts, Mr. ’Arry?”
“They are not to be told.” Again he rose to go, and stood and looked down on her, smiling. “I see you have already tried the crutches.”
“Yes. I found them in the snow, before the door. How I got there? I did hop. It was as if the good angels had come in the night. I wake and something make me all glad–and I go to the door to look at the whiteness, and then I am sorry, because of Sir Kildene, then I see before me–while that I stand on one foot, and hop–hop–hop–so, I see the crutch lie in the snow. Oh, Mr. ’Arry, now so pale you are! It is that you have worked in the night to make them–Is not? That is sorrowful to me. But now will I do for you pleasant things, because I can move to do them on these, where before I must always sit still–still–Ah, how that is hard to do! One good thing comes to me of this hurt. It makes the old shoes to last longer. How is it never to wear out shoes? Never to walk in them.”
Harry laughed. “We’ll have to make you some moccasins.”
“And what is moccasins? Ah, yes, the Indian shoe. I like them well, so soft they must be, and so pretty with the beads. I have seen once such shoes on one little Indian child. Her mother made them.”
Then Harry made her try the crutches to be sure they were quite right, and, seeing that they were a little too long, he measured them with care, and carried them back to the shed, and there he shortened them and polished them with sand and a piece of flint, until he succeeded in making a very workmanlike job of them.
At noon he brought them back, and stood in the doorway a moment beside her, looking out through the whiteness upon the transformed world. In spite of what that snow might mean to Larry Kildene, and through him to them, of calamity, maybe death, a certain elation possessed Harry. His body was braced to unusual energy by the keen, pure air, and his spirit enthralled and lifted to unconscious adoration by the vast mystery of a beauty, subtle and ethereal in its hushed eloquence. From the zenith through whiteness to whiteness the flakes sifted from the sky like a filmy bride’s veil thrown over the blue of the farthest and highest peaks, and swaying soft folds of lucent whiteness upon the earth–the trees–and upon the cabin, and as they stood there, closing them in together–the very center of mystery, their own souls. Again the passion swept through him, to gather her in his arms, and he held himself sternly and stiffly against it, and would have said something simple and common to break the spell, but he only faltered and looked down on his hands spread out before her, and what he said was: “Do you see blood on them?”
“Ah, no. Did you hurt your hand to cause blood on them, and to make those crutch for me?” she cried in consternation.
“No, no. It’s nothing. I have not hurt my hand. See, there’s no blood on the crutches.” He glanced at them as she leaned her weight on them there at his side, with a feeling of relief. It seemed as if they must show a stain, yet why should it be blood? “Come in. It’s too cold for you to stand in the door with no shawl. I mean to put enough wood in here to last you the rest of the day–and go–”
“Mr. ’Arry! Not to leave us? No, it is no need you go–for why?”
Her terror touched him. “No, I would not go again and leave you and your mother alone–not to save my soul. As you say, there is no need–as long as it is so still and the clouds are thin the snow will do little harm. It would be the driving, fine snow and the drifts that would delay him.”
“Yes, snow as we have it in the terrible Russia. I know such snow well,” said Madam Manovska.
They went in and closed the door, and sat down to eat. The meal was lighted only by the dancing flames from the hearth, and their faces glowed in the fitful light. Always the meals were conducted with a certain stately ceremony which made the lack of dishes, other than the shaped slabs of wood sawn from the ends of logs–odd make-shifts invented by Harry, seem merely an accident of the moment, while the bits of lace-edged linen that Amalia provided from their little store seemed quite in harmony with the air of grace and gentleness that surrounded the two women. It was as if they were using a service of silver and Sevres, and to have missed the graciousness of their ministrations, now that he had lived for a little while with them, would have been sorrow indeed.
He even forgot that he was clothed in rags, and wore them as if they were the faultless garments of a prince. It was only when he was alone that he looked down on them and sighed. One day he had come to the cabin to ask if he might take for a little while a needle and thread, but when he got there, the conversation wandered to discussion of the writers and the tragedies of the various nations and of their poets, and the needle and thread were forgotten.
To-day, as the snow fell, it reminded Amalia of his need, and she begged him to stay with them a little to see what the box he had rescued for them contained. He yielded, and, taking up the violin, he held it a moment to his chin as if he would play, then laid it down again without drawing the bow across it.
“Ah, Mr. ’Arry, it is that you play,” cried Amalia, in delight. “I know it. No man takes in his hand the violin thus, if he do not play.”
“I had a friend once who played. No, I can’t.” He turned away from it sadly, and she gently laid it back in its box, and caught up a piece of heavy material.
“Look. It is a little of this left. It is for you. My mother has much skill to make garments. Let us sew for you the blouse.”
“Yes, I’ll do that gladly. I have no other way to keep myself decent before you.”
“What would you have? All must serve or we die.” Madam Manovska spoke, “It is well, Sir ’Arry King, you carry your head like one prince, for I will make of you one peasant in this blouse.”
The two women laughed and measured him, and conferred volubly together in their own tongue, and he went out from their presence feeling that no prince had ever been so honored. They took also from their store warm socks of wool and gave him. Sadly he needed them, as he realized when he stepped out from their door, and the soft snow closed around his feet, chilling them with the cold.
As he looked up in the sky he saw the clouds were breaking, and the sun glowed through them like a great pale gold moon, even though the flakes continued to veil thinly the distance. His heart lightened and he went back to the cabin to tell them the good news, and to ask them to pray for clear skies to-morrow. Having been reared in a rigidly puritanic school of thought, the time was, when first he knew them, that the freedom with which Amalia spoke of the Deity, and of the Christ, and the saints, and her prayers, fell strangely upon his unaccustomed ears. He was reserved religiously, and seemed to think any mention of such topics should be made with bated breath, and the utmost solemnity. Often it had been in his mind to ask her concerning her beliefs, but his shyness on such themes had prevented.
Now that he had asked her he still wondered. He was used to feel that no one could be really devout, and yet speak so freely. Why–he could not have told. But now he began to understand, yet it was but a beginning. Could it be that she belonged to no church? Was it some sect of which he had never heard to which they belonged? If so, it must be a true faith, or it never could have upheld them through all their wanderings and afflictions, and, as he pondered, he found himself filled with a measure of the same trustful peace. During their flight across the plains together he had come to rest in them, and when his heart was too heavy to dare address the Deity in his own words, it was balm to his hurt spirit to hear them at their devotions as if thus God were drawn nearer him.
This time, whether he might lay it to their prayers or no, his hopes were fulfilled. The evening brought a clear sunset, and during the next day the snow melted and soon was gone, and a breeze sprang up and the clouds drifted away, and for several days thereafter the weather continued clear and dry.
Now often he brought his horse to the door, and lifted Amalia to the saddle and walked at her side, fearing she might rest her foot too firmly in the stirrup and so lose control of the horse in her pain. Always their way took them to the falls. And always he listened while Amalia talked. He allowed himself only the most meager liberty of expression. Distant and cold his manner often seemed to her, but intuitively she respected his moods, if moods they might be called: she suspected not.