# The Red Book Magazine/Volume 43/Number 5/Mazurka

Extracted from Red Book magazine, Sept 1924, pp. 73–77, 134–139. Accompanying illustrations may be omitted.
“What's the big idea?” she asked. “Yours is evidently wrong,” he replied. “Do you play or don't you?”
Illustrated by Lester Ralph
By Harold Mac Grath
Mazurka
AS she looked at her brother's thin, handsome face, there was mingled anger and pity in Mrs. Carnovan's fine blue eyes. The anger was aroused by his stubborn refusal to accept the inevitable; the pity was stirred by the basic cause of this stubbornness. These creative geniuses, high-strung and imaginative, were most difficult to handle. Silk and steel: she rather liked the simile. Away back in his childhood, he had been silk and steel.
“You're a fool, Geordie, to shut yourself away from human beings like this.”
“We've threshed that out a dozen times, Puss. What's the use of turning it over and over?”
Mallory held a folded newspaper in his right hand, and with this he tapped the piano against which he leaned. His left hand was hidden in the pocket of his velvet lounging-jacket.
“It isn't as if you'd always been like this,” went on Mrs. Carnovan. “Before the war, something was always going on in the studio here.” She waved her hand indirectly toward the paintings and sketches against the tapestried walls. “You are a great painter, Geordie. You are a great musician too. God gave you about everything—genius, money, good looks.”
“And one day took them away.” Mallory shrugged.
“Why, Geordie, you can still paint wonderfully. You haven't been up to the house in two months. We, who love you! That isn't kind. You never even telephone how-d'ye-do. I have to come down here to find out whether you're alive or dead. And I worry, day in and day out.”
His face softened. “Dear Puss, if I could change my nature, I would.”
“But your genius! You owe it to the world.”
“I have paid my debt to the world.” The bitterness in his soul broke forth in a savage note. “These arguments tear me to pieces. I wish to God you would not harp on the subject. I can't hold my palette. I have to set it on a stand under the canvas; and the awkwardness of it keeps the fury boiling in me. So my inspirations are ashes before I begin. And I can't play any more. I can't touch the piano. Always, when I was tired and discontented, I used to sit down and play my troubles away.”
“Geordie, in the war you were a brave man. But you do not take up life bravely now.”
His fury having subsided, he shrugged.
“If you were poor—” his sister went on.
“But I'm not poor,” he interrupted. “We get nowhere by supposition. I can't give away my money to test your theory.” His fury rose again, and his eyes burned. “If my arm had gone, I would have taken it like a sport; but to have all the sense of feeling, and still to be one-handed all the rest of my life! Oh, I can wriggle the fingers, make a fist of it; but that's all. I loved Grace; or thought I did. When she saw what had happened to me, she fainted—not out of pity, but at the thought of going through life with a cripple. So I let her go.”
“It was for your country,” said Mrs. Carnovan, tears in her eyes. “No one who loved you would ever mind, Geordie.”
“I'm a damned fool, Puss, but I can't change the fact.”
“Couldn't you work if you had some one to play for you?” she asked.
“Yes.”
He laughed, and stooped for the newspaper which he had dropped.
“A bit odd, that you should suggest that. The notion has been boiling in my head for several days. But I tell you frankly, Puss, I couldn't tolerate a man here, no matter how well he played. In a little he would be smoking cigarettes and talking. Besides, I could not find a good man pianist. If he were good, he'd scorn this kind of work.”
“But a woman—alone with you here?”
“Oh, that could be made proper enough. Miss Challoner, who has the studio below, could be induced to come up for an hour, three or four times a week. She is sixty, gray-haired and sensible. So the affair would have no color to it. I don't want anyone to play while I work. It's when I lay down the brushes. She can be as homely as a potato, if she can play the piano.”
It came to him that Sonia was telling him something she dared not utter vocally. There was a tragic note in everything she played
A woman. Mrs. Carnovan's distaste was imminent of expression. There were so many kinds of women in New York; and her brother George was so guileless, for all his birth and station. It did not matter that he was thirty-seven; he would be easy prey to a clever, unscrupulous woman. There were, she knew, many fine women musicians in town, struggling for sustenance; but none of these, aware of the countless pitfalls in New York, would step across yonder threshold.
But her second thought, stepping on the heels of the first, repressed the words that flew to her lips. She could see that he was excited over the notion. Adventure, the unknown! A beautiful woman to sit there at the piano and to play for him when he was moody and lonely. A dangerous business; and yet it might be the very thing to pull him back into the world again.
“How will you go about it?” she asked.
He flourished the newspaper, smiling.
Here again she felt dismayed. Supposing some inquisitive reporter saw the advertisement and investigated, giving his story an oblique twist? Sensation, everywhere sensation! Murder a person's reputation on a mere supposition, and apologize on the morning of the obsequies: gentle Geordie, hauled into the limelight under such conditions!
“I don't like it, Geordie. Wouldn't one of those player-pianos do?”
“For a person who loves good music but cannot play—yes. But to hear a Brahms rhapsody played a hundred times alike! I must have the human touch—some one to explore my moods. Sounds foolish, but that's the way it is.”
She understood that argument would be in vain: her brother had set his heart upon this adventure, come ill or good. After all, the conventional side was negligible; her distress was enlivened by the fear that he might be hurt again. She was positive that he still nursed the hurt given him by the other woman.
“All right, Geordie. But you must let me know what happens. If I didn't love you—”
“Dear old Puss!” Mallory put his arms around her and kissed her. “You haven't changed in twenty years. Always trying to stand between me and buffets. What the deuce! If I find a woman who plays to my content, Miss Challoner will be in the corner there. Besides, I've a notion I'll be vastly amused.”
“I shall want to see her.”
“You certainly shall.”
Mallory lived in one of the numbered streets, far downtown. It was a street of vanished glories—an old maid, living in genteel poverty, you might say. The house was three stories, brick and marble, with an iron fence, and a hand's-width of grass in between. All through the summer this bit of grass caught your eye and refreshed it.
The house was Mallory's, one among the many he shared with his sister; for their divided fortune lay in real-estate, scattered hither and yon about the city. The ground floor was the studio of a sculptor; the second floor was the home and workshop of Miss Challoner, a famous illustrator; the loft was Mallory's. In that day—that of th« building of the house—they gave you height along with substantiality. Mallory had remodeled the floor to his taste: all the comforts of home, with his studio across the threshold.
He painted landscapes and water-scenes—very well, too. Sometimes he sold a painting; sometimes he donated one to upstate public libraries. He was strangely indifferent about rewards. If he found himself happy after finishing a painting, that was sufficient. He had studied in Paris, Rome, Florence and Vienna, both at art and at music. As an amateur on the piano, he had won the respect of many a famous professional.
He resembled his sister in looks: handsome, brown-haired, blue-eyed, all lines as manly as hers were womanly; of medium height and slender, but with an almost inexhaustible store of nervous energy which had made him a formidable soldier. Stolidity makes a good defense, but it never wins any great battles.
When first the notion entered his mind about hiring a woman to play for him, the notion had been of a negligible character; but it had returned and returned again, more compelling, less negligible, on each return. He had not the least suspicion what the matter was—that he had grown desperately lonely and shy.
He had already asked Miss Challoner if she would play chaperon; and the illustrator had laughingly agreed. Thus a harbor had been established for the derelicts that were bound to enter port. Did he wish the unknown woman beautiful and young? For the life of him, he could not say. He did want music, the kind of music he loved; he was sure on this point. If the woman turned out to be agreeable to the eye, so much the better.
Later, he found himself wrangling with Miss Challoner about the wording of the advertisement.
“If you put an advertisement in the papers that you wanted a model, it would not stir a ripple of curiosity,” said Miss Challoner. “But to want a lady pianist from four till five, three times the week, with just the street and door-number—no; that wont do.”
“Good Lord, you don't expect me to use my name, do you?” he expostulated.
“My dear boy, this is New York. If you leave a single loop-hole for curiosity to enter—bang, it will enter! It's all above-board, isn't it?”
“But people who know me will think me a fool.”
“Well, you wanted my advice; I have given it. I imagine I'll have a lot of fun playing chaperon. I'll cuddle up in a shadowy corner and 'ahem' at the proper time.” Miss Challoner laughed. “Tell me exactly what you want. I'm old enough to be your mother—and I wish I were.”
“I want a woman to play the piano after I've quit work. I don't want to talk to her; I don't even want to know her name. I don't want any credentials. I want music.”
When he was gone back to his studio, Miss Challoner approached her window and looked out. She smiled, perhaps a little sadly. Spring—it was spring outside. Year in and year out, she felt the spring. To be sure, the urgings grew feebler and feebler; yet still she felt the recurrent longing. Once upon a time she had known what this longing signified; now it always puzzled her.
Spring. He thought it was music he wanted Poor boy, it was only spring calling, and he had not known exactly how to answer. He was thirty-seven? What had that to do with it? The Call laughed at years and locksmiths.
For all her sixty years of single blessedness, she was still a romantical fool; and the proof of it was, she was lending herself to a comedy that would fizzle out after the first act. Since when did true adventure come and sit on one's doorstep by invitation?
She returned to her easel. Children. For thirty years she had drawn children and babies for serials, short stories, magazine-covers and books. Children: the only kind she would ever have, children that became forgotten orphans the moment they passed from the studio. She laughed, understandingly. That was a child upstairs; hence, her interest.....
Three afternoons later, at half after three, she knocked and was admitted into Mallory's studio by Kuroki the Jap. She found her host pacing to and fro, and shrewdly suspected what the state of his mind was. Already he was regretting; but there was no evidence that he would not go on.
“You are going through with it?”
“Absolutely. I'm a fool, but a stubborn one.”
“Don't look at it that way. You're going to be amused and vastly astonished. And you're going to be tortured, too. What are you going to do with the others who follow the one you select?” she asked. “Something must be done to fend them off.”
“I hadn't thought of that,” answered Mallory, alarm flitting across his face. “I'll pin a card under the letter-box.”
“Well, I'll be getting into my chair,” said Miss Challoner.
This chair was beyond the piano, perfectly hidden from the eyes of any entering the door. Miss Challoner wanted it so, and he made no inquiries into her reasons.
Promptly at four the tragedy began—for it was a tragedy, of broken dreams, of hope that renewed itself only to fall shattered again. For years Mallory had moved among those of his kind, or he had made a hermit of himself. He wasn't ignorant of the fact that there existed another world; he had only forgotten it. Some of this world was now to pass in review and shock him indescribably.
Miss Challoner, out of her worldly wisdom, sensed something of what would probably be the outcome of this queer business: because the boy was tender-hearted, he would hire some one who neither pleased his eye nor his ear.
Presently a young woman crossed the threshold. Her expression was rather mousy. You have seen a mouse peek out of its knothole to get wind of a possible cat? Such was this young woman's expression. Seeing no figurative cat, she smiled easily.
“You advertised for a pianist?”
“Yes.” Mallory was certain that if he approached her, she would exhale the stiff odor of cheap perfume. “Play,” he said, with a gesture toward the grand piano. He was going to give them all a chance.
The girl walked over to the instrument and touched a few keys without sitting down. She then turned a pair of shallow blue eyes upon Mallory, and laughed.
“What's the big idea?” she asked impudently.
“Yours is evidently wrong,” he replied. “Do you play or don't you?”
Miss Challoner stood up. The girl saw her and backed slowly to the door, through which she vanished forever more.
“I expected that,” said Miss Challoner. “There will be more like her, and some of them worse. The poor thing!”
He was in time to see the bull-whip flash..... And then something infinitely proper happened to Joseph Wieniawski. The walls fell upon him.
“I'll go through with it. To those who try to please me, I'll give ten dollars.”
“You needn't worry about that type. All I'll have to do will be to stand up.”
“I feel like a fool, dragging you into this.”
“Young man, I'm going to have the time of my life. There goes the bell.”
Between four and half after five, six women stood trial and failed. Two of them were pretty, but they played mechanically and had no knowledge of pedals. Another had fine technique, but was soulless. The hands of the fourth were hopeless. The fifth was a middle-aged woman who played Beethoven with the same expression one gave to finger exercises. The sixth was a vocal accompanist. To each he gave ten dollars, together with profound pity.
“Discouraged?” Miss Challoner asked.
“No—only astonished.”
Ah, I see. Young man, I like you. It was not an easy thing to turn away those women to whom thirty a week would be a godsend. But if you keep this up, it's bound to cost you a pretty penny.”
“What did you think of them?” he countered.
“Exactly what you thought: that the young woman you are seeking had not come to-day.”
“Oh, she needn't be pretty nor young,” he said, covering his embarrassment by reaching for his pipe. “I want a real musician or nothing. Do you know, I've been very selfish.”
“I'm sure of it. You have had your first lesson in philanthropy. There is always some one worse off in the world than you. This adventure is largely going to help you to forget. That's why I entered it in the capacity of dragon.”
Mallory paced and smoked. Presently he halted.
“You'll come tomorrow?”
“Until the play is finished.”
“I'm very grateful.”
“The pleasure is mine.”
The second day went by precisely as the first: seven disappointments and seven times ten dollars. But on the beginning of the third day the City of New York took a hand in the game, represented by a uniformed policeman.
“Say, what's goin' on here? Come across.”
“I'll not accept that tone from any man on God's earth,” cried Mallory wrathfully. “You speak civilly, or clear out.”
This was Miss Challoner's cue to rise from her chair; but the belligerent note in Mallory's tones decided her to wait a minute or two.
“I was sent here to find out what's goin' on. If you wont tell me, why, you'll come along and tell it to the judge. Take your pick,” grumbled the policeman.
“My advertisement states that I wish to hire a woman familiar with classical music. I see no crime in that.”
“Huh!” said the policeman skeptically. “Mebbe you aint gonna offer a fine job as concert player or in grand opera? Ye-ah! You're always puttin' it over in some new way.”
“Very good,” said Mallory. “I'll get my hat, and we'll talk it over with the judge.”
He was boiling with fury, a mixed fury. To have gone into this thing without examining all the possibilities, to have had his pity stirred profoundly, and now to have the law enter into his private affairs!
“No,” said Miss Challoner, who had heard enough.
The policeman, beholding this handsome white-haired woman, lost momentarily the control of his jaw, which sagged comically.
“Mr. Mallory should tell you that he wanted a first-class pianist to play after his day's work is done. He was himself a fine musician, but the war has disabled him, and he cannot play the piano any more.”
“Why didn't he say so?” demanded the policeman. “Nothin' wrong with that. I was detailed to have a look. They's so many games goin' on to get the young girls away from home, that this sounded like another. I'll tell the lieutenant.” The crestfallen policeman let himself out.
A reporter called the following day. But he was an amiable young man, and was quick to see that his assignment was a soap-bubble.
HE took himself off—and Sonia Wieniawski took herself in. Neither Miss Challoner nor Mallory heard her enter. They stood behind the piano, discussing the advent of the reporter. So the newcomer remained by the door, waiting to be observed.
She was not beautiful; she was scarcely pretty. Seen upon the street, she would not have invited a second glance. But for all that, her face was fine. There are some faces that are direct mirrors of emotion; and Sonia's was such. Let a beautiful thought enter her mind, and her face became beautiful. Her complexion seemed to be dead white, but inspection discovered it to be of the palest olive. Her hair was jet black and done in an old-fashioned way that gave you the height and width of her brow. Her eyes were large, blue-gray, and set well apart. There was no peasant blood here. Seen across the room, there was but one bit of color—her scarlet lips, now held tightly against her teeth.
She was dressed in black, but this did not disguise her young and shapely body. Her hat was a nondescript sort of bonnet, as colorless as her dress.
Mallory turned and saw her, with more indifference than he usually accorded an unknown woman. As a matter of fact, he saw in her the type that was now beginning to bore him inexpressibly, for all that his pity was still undulled.
“I beg your pardon,” he said, coming forward. “You have come in answer to the advertisement?”
Sonia nodded. The thing she feared was not in this room: so a door in her heart opened, letting forth the natural gayety. For a moment her face became beautiful. She approached the piano and sat down, striking a few chords and running a scale or two. Then, with her gaze directed toward a patch of blue sky beyond the window at her right, she began the tender, dreamy “Mazurka in A Minor'”—Chopin's.
Mallory had put himself into his chair loosely, his elbows on the arms, the good hand over the useless. Miss Challoner watched him closely. Presently she saw him sit up and lean forward, his face no longer dulled by apathy. Indeed, his expression was one of complete astonishment.
“Play that over again,” he said.
“The mood is gone,” Sonia replied. “I should not play it well.”
Her voice was sweet and her accent charming. She spoke slowly, is if her native tongue lay in ambush and she feared it.
“Very well, then,” said Mallory, with understanding. “Play whatever comes into your mind.”
Miss Challoner sighed. Spring had entered into the studio. Oh, well she knew the signs.
Sonia sat for a moment with her hands folded in her lap. Suddenly the room became filled with the majesty of Brahms' “Rhapsody in E Flat.” Then Liszt's transcription of the spinning song from “The Flying Dutchman,” and the “Butterfly Etude” and “Second Nocturne”—Chopin. The riot of color that bedecked the walls, the Oriental rugs on the floor, the thin, handsome face of the man who, she knew, would never harm her, had drawn her to her great countryman. When the last exquisite cascade of notes died away, she did not turn to Mallory for his approval.
He really wanted to praise her, but a sudden shyness blocked the impulse. This girl had the genius of interpretation; there was soul as well as intellect in her performance. And of all things—that mazurka, his favorite of the Chopin mazurkas!
Mallory walked over to the piano. “Can you come Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays at this hour?”
“Yes.”
“What is your name?”
“Sonia Wieniawski.”
“You are Polish?”
“Yes.”
“I'll try to explain. I used to play for my own amusement, but an injury has made that impossible. Miss Challoner will always be here when you come.”
“Then you will want me?”
“Yes. Will thirty dollars the week be satisfactory?”
“Oh, yes!”
“Give me your address, to save you unnecessary steps, should I be called away from the studio.”
“I will not mind that—steps. And if I do not appear some afternoon, it will be because I cannot come.” She rose from the piano seat.
“Where did you study?” he asked.
“Cracow and Leipzig.”
“You speak English very well.”
She did not reply, and it came into his mind that her uncommunicativeness was set. Something warned him that if he pressed her for address and history, he would never see her again.
“WHAT do you think of her?” Mallory asked, as later he and Miss Challoner drank tea.
“Wonderful! She really ought to be in concert.”
“You have never heard of her before?”
“Never; and I don't believe anyone else has.”
“I am still rather dazed. I don't know how she did it, but she played the very things my mood demanded.”
“Spring,” said Miss Challoner.
Mallory laughed. “I know exactly what's in your mind. You are going to marry this girl to me, and we're going to be happy ever after. Rot!”
“Haven't you ever felt the spring?”
“Not beyond the annual cold.” Mallory rose, brushing the cake-crumbs from his clothes.
“Supposing some afternoon I find it impossible to come?”
“Then I'll dismiss the girl. I shall never be alone with her for a minute. You may lay to that.”
But an amazing phenomenon took place the moment he returned to his studio. He found himself alone with Sonia: for to think of another is to be with that other. He had to admit that he was excited, intrigued. That mazurka—he had played it a thousand times! And she had given it a new accent. He got his hat and coat and went out for a long walk in the fading daylight.
Lonely; he was lonely, terribly lonely. Perhaps he had made an ass of himself over his hand. But he knew that he would not make an ass of himself over this strange Polish girl.
MALLORY'S sister did not know what to think. The girl mystified her. With her woman's eye, accentuated by sisterly alarm, she had tried to find flaws in the Polish girl who spoke but little, but who played beautifully. Peasant or aristocrat, she could not discover. Genius was a great refiner.
There was nothing against the girl, save her unknown background. Mrs. Carnovan liked the pleasant and dignified manner by which she refused a cup of tea and went her way. Still, she had a notion to get rid of the girl by exciting her brother's interest in another direction.
“Geordie, she is really an artist. There's something wrong. She ought to be on the concert stage. Why not use your influence?”
“I've got that in mind,” Mallory replied. “You see, Puss, there are lots of men and women who play beautifully, but cannot face an audience. This girl may be one of those unfortunates. So one of these days I'll fill the studio and see how she carries on.”
His sister sighed relievedly. But Miss Challoner smiled; she knew all about spring.
So the little drama rolled on to its objective. April merged into May; and spring began to take active part in the affairs of men. Spring reënergizes earth and mankind and Mallory began to look forward eagerly. If Sonia did not appear on the hour—as sometimes she did not—he paced the studio and wondered if she had been hurt. But this wonder was unspoken.
To Mallory, Sonia's face began to grow beautiful, as a sketch grows beautiful when painted in. His usually keen eyes did not note, however (as Miss Challoner's did), that twice Sonia had entered the studio with a suspicious redness around her eyes.
His canvas grew; and Miss Challoner watched it with kindly envy. Fortunate young man, never to have had this gift bludgeoned by necessity!
It was still spring; but she now began to doubt. She had never intercepted any glances between the girl and Mallory. The girl still refused to step outside her employment. Always when the impromptu concert was done, Sonia went her way. And never any visible effort on Mallory's part to find out where Sonia lived or what her history was. In all, twelve visits; and the boy had not yet taken Sonia's hand in his, to welcome her when she came and to speed her when she departed. Miss Challoner had been expecting words, when only sounds sufficed. What more exquisite dialogue in the world than that of a woman playing music to a lonely man?
IT began to rain that afternoon, and when Sonia came in, she was wearing a dilapidated rain-coat which had not offered much protection. Today Mallory sprang forward as he noted that she was having some difficulty in extricating her arm from a sleeve.
“No, no!” she cried. “It's all right. I can get it off.”
But with a laugh he caught the offending sleeve and gave it a vigorous yank. It was not possible for Sonia to grow paler than she was; but her lips lost color, her eyes closed, and she swayed slightly.
“What is it?” Mallory asked. “Are you hurt?”
There was something in his voice that renewed Miss Challoner's faith in spring.
“It is nothing,” Sonia protested, “nothing.”
“If you do not feel well—”
“I will play to you,” she interrupted.
She smiled; but the color was not yet returned to her lips.
“Rest awhile, anyhow,” he insisted.
“I have only the hour.”
Restless to be gone, thought Miss Challoner. What had happened?
Sonia brushed past Mallory to the piano and began to play. Mallory did not understand women, but he did understand music, every nuance; and it came to him, with a queer thrill, that Sonia was telling him something that she dared not utter vocally. There was a tragic note in everything she played; even Miss Challoner recognized this fact.
Sonia was telling him that she was grateful for his kindness, for the fact that he had never tried to approach her in equality, and for giving her this contented hour in which her soul went among the clouds as aforetime—told him that she was in a hell which was tightening about her day by day, and said good-by!
Her dress was invariably the same—black, never an extra ribbon. And yet she loved color; this love emanated from her as perfume from a flower, subtly, the moment she touched the piano-keys.
Today Mallory did not dream in his chair, but leaned with his elbows on his knees, watching the white sure fingers—beautiful hands. Sonia was between him and the light. He saw a blue shadow on her left forearm, or what he believed was a shadow; but presently he discovered that it moved with the arm. It was a bruise.
AS usual she never glanced in his direction. Her gaze was set upon the keys as or upon the sky beyond the window. To-day, however, her gaze frequently swerved to the vase of roses standing upon the piano-top, beyond the music-rest.
What a memory the girl had, he thought. All these compositions without a note to refer to, and never falter. He himself knew something about this gift and the labor to round it out. Nevertheless, it was something always to marvel over.
The hour drew to its end. Sonia arose. She arose in dim wonder that she had gone through this hour without faltering, that the pain of her body had not broken through the strength of her will.
Mallory plucked the roses from the vase. “Take these home with you,” he said.
“For me?” Her astonishment broke down the wall of her reserve. Pleasure flowed into her eyes, her mouth; she was for the moment beautiful.
“I'll get a box for you. Where did you learn to speak English so well?”
“My mother was English,” said Sonia, clasping the flowers in her arms.
“Who did that—the bruise, there?”
Sonia looked down at her forearm; and the walls rose up about her again.
“A crowded car,” she lied. “Thank you the roses. They are so beautiful.”
“Friday I'm having a few friends in to tea. I have written out a program, and I wonder if you'd mind playing it?”
“Let me see it, for I shall have to practice,” she responded, knowing full well that today she was leaving this pleasant atmosphere forever.
So then, thought Mallory, it wasn't stage-fright, the curse of many a talented performer! Somewhere she had faced audiences. The mystery surrounding her was only intensified.
“You confuse me as much as this girl does,” declared Miss Challoner, after Sonia was gone.
“What do you mean by that?”
“Haven't you any curiosity?”
“Oh, I have my share. If I quizzed her directly, she might never return.”
“Would that matter?”
Mallory laughed. “It would. If she disappeared now, without me knowing anything about her, she'd haunt me till the end of my days.”
“Did you notice her face when you gave her the roses?”
“Yes. I suppose you've still got that bug—wanting me to marry her?” He laughed again, amused. He took her quizzing as raillery out of friendship of long standing.
“Have you never been in love?”
He thought this going a little too far. “I believe I can honestly say no to that. I may have seen a mirage. Anyhow, Sonia wears no ring.”
“That signifies nothing these cynical days. But what was the matter when you pulled the sleeve of her rain-coat? I thought she was going to faint.”
Mallory frowned. “I believe she's been manhandled.”
“I'm sure of it. She comes in here as one would enter the City of Refuge. And each time she leaves the neighborhood in the company of a man I shouldn't care to be left alone with in the dark.”
“How did you find that out?”
“I'm curious. A friend of mine lives opposite, and I set her to watch.”
“What does he look like?” Mallory was visibly excited.
“Tall, lumbering, middle-aged, a scraggly beard like that of men who never shave—an unkempt creature. And Sonia is clean. Not possibly her father. He would have made himself known. Married? It might be that.”
Suddenly Mallory's honesty stepped out of its mental hiding. The girl had caught his interest from the start, and this had gone on compounding with each visit. There was no love-nonsense in this interest: the searchlight of introspection revealed nothing beyond a friendly attitude. If ever he loved, it would be some one of his kind. A Pole whose antecedents he knew nothing about: it wasn't to be thought of. Music was well enough; but George Mallory's wife would have to possess distinctions
He knew that shortly he would know all about her; but there was no need of telling Miss Challoner that he had set a private detective upon Sonia's trail.
THE detective arrived that night, while Mallory was at dinner. Mallory had not expected to see him so soon.
“Take a chair and draw up,” he said. What was he going to hear?
“I believe I have about all you want to know,” began the detective. “Her name is Sonia Wieniawski, all right. From nine until one each night she plays the piano in a dance-hall which, through some political influence, has escaped raiding.”
“A dance-hall?”
“Low, too. But she might be on a desert island, for all the notice she gives the gangsters.”
“How far is it from where she lives?”
“About four blocks. On her way home, no one molests her, for a very good reason. Her uncle takes her home.”
“What kind of a man is he?”
The detective fiddled with a spoon for a moment. “Queer thing, there. But I'll come to that as I go on with my report. I went to the girl one night, during intermission, and bluffed some facts out of her. Her uncle was out of the way. Well, her father was first violin in Cracow; her mother was the daughter of an English clergyman. Runaway match, I imagine. The mother died when Sonia was about fourteen; the father died two years ago.”
MALLORY got out his pipe. Over in the corner there, he saw Sonia's face above the roses.
“Her father's brother came to New York years ago. The brothers wrote occasionally. When her father died, the girl decided to come to America, where fortunes lay about in gutters. Her uncle told her to come. She had never seen this uncle. I guess the girl was pretty good at the piano—she told me she made her début in Cracow. But almost immediately upon her arrival here, she mysteriously lost the documents in the case, the clippings, her letters of introduction, her program. She was without corroboration, without money, without influence—well, this is New York, Mr. Mallory.”
“Go on.”
“She told me that her uncle had hunted the agencies up and down, without success. Now, none of the well-known agencies had ever heard of Sonia Wieniawski.”
“You mean that this uncle never really approached the agencies?”
“That's about the size of it.”
“But I don't understand. The girl is a great musician.”
“You'll understand presently. This Sonia is straight, clean-cut; but this is a strange land. She doesn't know the ropes, and is helpless. I've run across this stuff often; but this Sonia is strong. I had to threaten her with the law before I could get these facts.”
“Something crooked in the background, do you think?”
“I'm darned sure there is. I'd never seen Joseph Wieniawski before, but I didn't cotton to him, not for a cent. He's dirty inside and out. He gets her a job in a dance-hall, where the men are gunmen, dopes or cadets. I'm not sure, but it's my opinion he sent her here because you are a rich man.” The detective paused to let this sink in.
It did sink in. Mallory now understood why Sonia had been so close-lipped. Her uncle, flesh and blood; and in her pride she had refused to betray him.
“I have never been on the regular force, but I've got friends there; and I brought one along with me one night to get a line on Wieniawski. The man was instantly identified as Nikolai Muraviev.”
“Not her uncle?”
“Wait a minute. Muraviev did time at Sing Sing for white-slaving.”
“Good God!”
“We went through his trunk. There were papers identifying him as Wieniawski, her father's letters and—her missing documents. He may be the girl's uncle; he may have gone to prison under an alias. There's nothing on him now; so there it hangs. Joseph was never naturalized. Now, my opinion is, he's not going to waste the girl. Big money, and you're the mark. If she were under age, we could step in; but she's twenty-four, and we have no authority. She came into the country with five hundred and a good passport.”
“I'm much obliged to you.”
“The skunk beats her.”
“What?” cried Mallory, half out of his chair. “He beats her?”
“So the neighbors say.” The detective laid a slip of paper on the table. “Here's the addresses—the house and the dance-hall. I think your influence can straighten the matter.”
“It shall,” said Mallory grimly.
AFTER the detective was gone, Mallory resurrected an old fishing-suit, a cap to match, and wore them forth into the night. He hadn't the least notion what he was going to do; he was conscious of little besides a boiling rage which a long walk did not serve to cool. One phase became clear: Sonia had not told her uncle that she had not been alone with him in the studio..... The damned filthy hound! Men like that in this world! His purpose formed suddenly, and he knew precisely what he intended doing.
He found the dance-hall, a low-ceilinged loft, poorly ventilated and redolent of Turkish tobacco and cheap perfume. Silly young girls, with knowing airs, and slope-shouldered young men, with dull eyes, rotated across the floor, their combined gestures similar to those of the dancing Negroids of the jungles. At the far end of the hall was a small stage, and upon this sat the musicians, four in number: a saxophone, a violin, drums and a piano. The smoke partially obscured Sonia's face; but oddly enough, his imagination filled out the nebulous: the scarlet mouth and the blue-gray eyes that always reminded him of the sea in a morning fog that was permeated by sunshine.
Mazurka! Sonia, playing jazz to this riffraff, her soul tortured by the ugly sounds! He felt, bubbling up within him, that same furious force which had driven him berserker in battle. He lusted to kill; and had he seen the uncle near by, he would have set upon the man.
But bewilderment quickly shouldered his fury to a second level. Sonia—what was she to him that he should stand on the threshold of this evil-smelling place, lusting to kill the man who called himself Sonia's uncle? The damnable injustice being meted out to her: maybe that had something to do with his present mood.
Intermission came. The men in the orchestra stepped down from the stage and mingled with the crowd; but Sonia remained at the piano, a slender figure in basalt and marble. Several young toughs sat on the stage rim and tried to start a conversation, but without success. They were baiting her. There was a roaring in Mallory's ears; but he held himself in. A row would merely transport him to some hospital; and Sonia would vanish out of his orbit forever.
The crowd by the side door, presumably leading into some refreshment room, eddied. A tall man was plowing his way through. He crossed the waxed floor to the stage, mounted it, and began to talk to Sonia. Instantly Mallory knew that this would be the uncle.
Mallory turned and went down into the street, sensing bitterly his impotence. It was not quite ten; three hours must pass before the dance-hall closed. So he tramped about the streets for a taxicab; in this he rode around town for three hours.
{[di|W]}IENIAWSKI opened the door of the flat and pushed Sonia rudely inside. He shut the door without locking it, so violent was his temper. He had been drinking, and his piggish eyes were swollen and bloodshot.
“So! You lie to me, eh?”
Sonia did not answer, but walked over to the table where the gift of roses stood. Wieniawski stalked after, caught up the flowers and dashed them to the floor, trampling on them.
“There was a woman always there,” he roared. “You lie to me, eh?”
“My father's brother, you will never make me a bad woman. I'll die first.” She spoke quietly. She looked down at the crushed flowers: her heart was there, crushed likewise.
“We'll see.” From the wall he took down a short bull-whip and flourished it. “We'll see about this pride.”
Mallory, in the hall, heard the voices, but he could make no sense of the words—Polish.
“No, no, no!” came Sonia's voice. This was followed immediately by a snapping sound and a moan.
MALLORY took the doorknob in his hand, tried his weight against the door, and was astonished to find it unlocked. He was in time to see the bull-whip flash around Sonia's body. And then something infinitely proper happened to Joseph Wieniawski, or Nikolai Muraviev, or whatever he called himself. The walls fell upon him, figuratively; he was pressed and rolled about upon a flaming gridiron; and when Mallory flung the whip upon him, Wieniawski-Muraviev was not an agreeable thing for the casual eye.
Mallory turned to Sonia. She was still upon her knees, where she had fallen after the second blow, her palms against her cheeks, her beautiful eyes fairly discrediting what they saw. It was only when Mallory touched her gently on the shoulder that she was made to understand that this scene was not a dream.
“Will you come with me, Sonia?”
“Yes.”
From below somewhere within her, rose a vast sense of the ironic. That thing trying to get upon its hands and knees had beaten her because she would not do the very thing she was now on the way to do.
“Any keepsakes you wish to take along?”
“No.”
“Let's be off, then.”
Mallory had stationed a taxicab at the corner, and into this he helped Sonia, whose mind and body were queerly numb. This kindly handsome man would be kind to her so long as he wanted her; so nothing mattered. But oh, the dreams, the dreams that had vanished forever!
“Whether that man is your uncle or not, we can't say; but he shall never lay eyes upon you again,” said Mallory. “The dog! I understand everything, Sonia. A woman like you, unless she comes well armed and protected, generally goes through a variety of hells. But that's over with. The war spoiled one of my hands, Sonia. Will you mind that?”
“Which hand?”
“This.”
Sonia groped for it and laid it against her cold cheek. She would give him her life, if he wanted it. What did it matter? To be sold, that was horror; but to give..... That first day: his kindly aloofness, the complete understanding of her art, himself an artist! The thrill of climbing those stairs, the despair in going down them: from an environment that was natural to her instincts and education, to one that was unnatural, abhorrent! For a little while, then; let the future be what it might.
As the cab rolled on, Mallory threw all doubt, all questioning, out of his mind. He wanted Sonia. Miss Challoner and her talk of spring! She was right. He had not craved for music alone; he had oddly, in a bizarre fashion, sent forth his Call, and Sonia had answered. What his sister said, what his world said, would never matter. He and Sonia would build a world of their own. She had come forth into the night with him, unquestioning; so there was no real fear in him regarding the end of his adventure.
“Do you care a little?” he asked.
“More than God will ever forgive.”
“And you will marry me tomorrow?”
Thunder fell upon Sonia's ears. “What did you say?”
“Will you will marry me tomorrow?”
SONIA began to laugh, wildly; but immediately this laughter stumbled into tears. Out of a dungeon, into the brilliant sunshine: she was blinded. She had forgotten that here in America men married the women they loved.
Mallory, with infinite understanding, put his arms around her and held her so all the way uptown to his sister's door.
As the cab stopped, Sonia whispered shyly: “You might kiss me. No other man shall.”
“Good Lord! So I might!”
And the double laughter startled the silent street.
This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published before January 1, 1929.
The longest-living author of this work died in 1932, so this work is in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 91 years or less. This work may be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works.
Public domainPublic domainfalsefalse