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 littlecaféto 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 thetable d'hôtewas 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.
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.
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 steamshipCity 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 acaféat 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 thecaféwhere 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.
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 thecafé. 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 was a pleasant day dream, one from which Von Barwig did not like to awaken himself. He pictured to himself the joy, the happiness of his loved ones when they saw him, and thus he felt the reflex of this joy. These mental pictures were almost real to him, and he enjoyed them while they lasted, though he knew that they were not real.
"It is better to dream than to think of the present," he said to himself. "What is there going on about me but misery and starvation and folly? Why should I focus my mind on the evils of existence, analyse them, make them my bosom companions to the exclusion of all joy? No, I will think of those things that make for happiness. Little Hélène shall be my companion. These shadows" (and he looked at the people who passed him), "these caricatures of life shall not find a place in my mind. I will shut them out and in that way they shall cease to exist for me; since what we do not know cannot make us suffer."
Von Barwig walked down the crowded thoroughfare, barely conscious that he was dreaming, yet in his dreams finding peace. The old man knew that there was a musical instrument shop somewhere in the neighbourhood, but it is quite possible that he would have passed it by had not the sound of a loud, roaring voice, accompanied by the banging of a big drum, attracted, or rather demanded his attention and aroused him from his day dream.
"Eat 'em alive, eat 'em alive!" bellowed the voice. Bang! bang! went the drum. "Bosco, Bosco, the armless wonder," bang! bang! "bites their heads off and eats their bodies; eats 'em alive, eats 'em alive!" Bang! bang! "Bosco, Bosco!" the drum punctuating each phrase, making a hideous, ear-splitting duet.
"What hellish syncopation!" thought poor Von Barwig mechanically, as he looked at the individual from whom issued the voice that sounded so like the bellowing of a bull.
The owner of this extraordinary vocal organ was a big, fat, florid-faced individual with a dark, bluish-red complexion. He wore a flaring diamond ring around a glaring red necktie; and a loud checked suit that matched his voice perfectly. In fact, his whole make-up harmonised remarkably with the unearthly noise that issued from his throat. He was standing before a flashy-fronted building, on which was painted in large yellow letters, intended to be gold, the legend "Dime Museum." In the front entrance were several cheap wax figures of a theatrical nature, and some still cheaper scenes, showing the figure of a nude savage without arms, biting the head off a huge fish and eating it alive apparently. On the canvas were also painted pictures of a wild man from Borneo, a tattooed man, a skeleton, numerous fat ladies, mermaids, sylphs, and fauns; the whole forming a group of pictures and figures calculated to arrest the attention of the passers-by and attract them into the "theatretorium," as he of the loud voice called it.
It was not the paintings that caught Von Barwig's attention; it was the voice that offended his sensitive ear. He looked at the man in astonishment; never in his life had he heard such an utter lack of music in a human voice, such volume of tone, such a surplusage of quantity and an absence of quality. Barwig was fascinated and wondered how it could be possible. At this moment he caught the man's eye, and then a strange thing happened. The man stopped roaring, and, looking over at Von Barwig, in a more natural tone called out:
"Say, professor, I want to see you."
"Are you speaking to me?" said Von Barwig; his voice faltering.
"Yes," replied the showman, "that's just what I am." Coming over to Von Barwig he took him by the arm and led him almost by force into the entrance of the Museum. "Say, professor," he asked, "how would you like a job?"
"A job?" Von Barwig repeated helplessly, trying to realise the meaning of the man's words.
"A job; yes, to be sure. Can you thump the ivories?"
"Thump the ivories?" Von Barwig looked so mystified that the man volunteered an explanation.
"Play the pianner," and suiting the action to the word he perforated the air with ten large fingers.
"I play—yes. I—I play a little—not well——"
"Well, do you want the job? We've got a day professor, but we need a night professor. Day professor plays from eight till eight; night professor from eight till two or three. Depends on the crowds. Come on, now; I like your looks. Say the word and the job is yours."
It was not pride that made Von Barwig silent when he wanted to speak; he simply did not grasp the man's meaning.
"I see you've got your fiddle there. You can play the incidental music for the dramas with that; and you can play the pianner for the curios and the intermissions. Dollar a night; what do you say?"
"A dollar a night!" Von Barwig at last caught the man's meaning. He wanted him to play for that amount, at night, and it would not interfere with his teaching in the daytime.
"I only play a very little, just enough to show my pupils," he said deprecatingly.
"Oh, you're all right! You can read music, can't you?"
Von Barwig smiled. "Yes," he replied simply.
"Well, you'll get on to it."
But Von Barwig still held back.
"What's the matter, ain't it enough?"
Von Barwig was silent.
"Damn it all," the showman blurted out. "I'll risk it; a dollar and a half a night. Your long hair is worth that; you look the goods. I'll make a special feature of you—a real professor. Come on inside and take a look at the place. A dollar and a half a night, eight till three; is it a bargain?"
Von Barwig paused, then drew a long deep breath and nodded affirmatively.
"You'll be fine—fine," said he of the big voice. "I can see it in your eye; you ain't one of them smart felleys."
He grabbed the hand of his new attraction and shook it heartily. "Say, George," he roared, "come here! This is the new night professor."
George, the young man who was beating the drum, ceased that occupation and came over to the showman and Von Barwig.
"What's your name?" the showman suddenly asked Von Barwig.
"Anton Von Barwig," came the reply in a low tone.
"Well, Anton, my name is Costello, Al Costello." Then with dignity, "Professor Anton, shake hands with George Pike—he's my assistant. This is the new night professor, George."
"Happy to meet you, professor," said that individual, grasping Von Barwig's hand and shaking it effusively. This hand-shaking process seemed a part of the theatrical trade.
"Say, George, take him inside and introduce him to the curios and just tell 'em from me that if they don't treat him better than they did the other night professor, by the eternal jumpin' Jerusalem, I'll fire the whole bunch!" With that Mr. Costello slapped Von Barwig on the back, and resumed his occupation of attracting public attention.
As George and Von Barwig passed the turnstile and went up the passage that led into the main hall, the huge voice outside continued to roar.
"Bosco, Bosco, the armless wonder! Bites their heads off and eats their bodies; eats them alive, eats them alive!" And so Anton Von Barwig became the night professor in a dime museum on the Bowery.
It astonished even Von Barwig himself, when he found how easily he adapted himself to his new position. In a very short time he found his occupation far less irksome and tedious than he had expected. As to the disgrace of appearing nightly in a dime museum, Von Barwig felt it keenly enough, but he preferred to pay his way and suffer himself, rather than to make others suffer through his inability to make sufficient money to meet his expenses. Not a word escaped him as to his new engagement, for he was determined not to parade his shame before his friends' eyes until it became absolutely necessary for them to know.