Part 20 (1/2)

It was only when a slender, dark, elderly man stepped down to the footlights with a violin in his long, thin hands that Archie sat bolt upright, his eyes blazing with excitement, his breath catching in his throat.

The great man's face was fine as an engraving, with a melancholy mouth, and eyes that burned like black fires. He stood a brief second, gave his head, crowned with long, grey hair, a quick, nervous toss, and drew his bow across the strings softly, sweetly, with a heart-breaking sound that fell on his listeners like the sob of a thousand winds. For five minutes he held them spellbound. It was only when he half smiled and stepped into the stage wings that they realized that it was over. Then with one accord the entire audience broke into a storm of applause--all but Archie, who sat with locked fingers and tense face; for the life of him he could not move a single muscle--he was simply paralyzed with pleasure; at last he had listened to _music_!

It was nearing the end of the programme, and Ventnor had stepped forth to play his last number. It was a wild, eerie Hungarian air, that wailed and whispered like a lost child, then mounted up, up, louder, louder, a perfect hurricane of melody, when--suddenly a sharp crack like a pistol shot cut the air. The music ceased--one of the violin strings had snapped. At another time the great man would have finished the number on the three remaining strings, but the heat, the lax practice of a holiday season--something, or perhaps everything combined, for the instant overcame him. He stood like an awkward child, gazing down at the trailing, useless string.

Instantly, Archie's sensitive brain grasped the whole situation.

Ventnor's business manager was not with him; he had not brought a second violin. Like a flash Archie whipped his own out of its case. He had just come from his lesson; it was in perfect tune. Before the shy, frail boy knew what he was actually doing he was beside the footlights, handing his own violin up to the great master, whose wonderful eyes gazed down into the small, pale face, and whose hand immediately reached out, grasping the poor, cheap little fiddle that Archie had learned his scales on. The audience broke into applause, but with a single glance Ventnor stilled them, and dashed straight into the melody precisely where he had left off.

Archie could hardly believe his ears. Was _that_ his old thirty-dollar fiddle? That marvellous thing that murmured, and wept, and laughed under the master hand! Oh! the voice of it! The voice of it!

They would not let Ventnor go when he smiled himself off the stage.

They called and shouted, ”Encore!” ”Encore!” until he returned to respond--respond, not with his own priceless instrument, but with Archie's, and with a grace and kindliness that only a great man possesses. He played a good-night lullaby on the boy's cheap little violin, and, moreover, played it as he never had before. Archie remembered afterwards that he had presence of mind enough to get on his feet when they all sang ”G.o.d Save the King,” but it really seemed a dream that Ventnor was shaking hands with him and saying, ”I t'ank you, me; I t'ank you. You save me great awkwardness.” And then, before he knew it, he had promised to go to the hotel the next day and play for Ventnor.

All the way home he was thinking, ”Fancy it!--I, Archie Anderson, asked to play before Ventnor!” Then came the fuss and the delight of the people at home over his good fortune, but he soon slipped away to bed, exhausted with the evening's events. His mother, coming into the room later to say good-night, saw that close to his bed, on a table where he could reach out and touch it during the night, lay his violin.

”Motherette,” he smiled happily, ”I feel that it is consecrated.”

”Keep it so, little lad of mine. Keep both your music and your violin consecrated.”

Never had Archie played so well, for all his shyness and nervousness. He seemed to gather something of the great man's soul as he played before him at the hotel the following day.

Ventnor became greatly excited. ”Boy, boy!” he cried, ”you have a great music in you! You must have study and work, like what is it you Canadians say?--like Sam Hill!”

”Yes,” said Archie, quietly; ”rainy days and east wind days, when I coughed and could not go to school, I worked, and--well, I just worked.”

”Me, I should t'ink you did! Why, boy, I will make you great. I will teach you all this summer.”

”I'm afraid father can't afford that,” faltered Archie.

”Me, I tell you I holiday now. I take no money in my holiday. I teach you because I like you, me,” replied the master, irritably.

”But I can never repay you,” answered Archie.

”Me, I will give to the world a great musician; it is you! That's repay enough for me--the satisfaction of making one great violinist. That's repay.”

And so it all came about. Day after day Ventnor taught, trained and encouraged Archie Anderson. Day after day the boy drew greater music from the heart of his fiddle. He seemed to stride ahead under the power of the master; and as for Ventnor, he seemed beside himself with joy at what he called his ”find.” They grew to be friends. Archie confided his great discouragement of ill-health, his inability to attend school.

”Me, I fix all that,” answered Ventnor. ”Me, I go see to-night your parents. I talk to them.” And he did, but his ”talk” amazed even the boy. He wanted Archie to go with him to California, where his autumn season began. He wanted to adopt him, to take him away for two years. He gesticulated, and raised his eyebrows, and talked down every objection they had.

”I tell you I want him. I make a virtuoso of him. He is _my_ boy. I discover him. He's good boy; he work, work, work. Never do I see a boy work like dat. He is in earnest. Dat is de greatest t'ing a boy can have, to be earnest. It make him a great, good man. He's not selfish either. He not t'ink of himself, only other beeple. I meet with misfortune. I break my string. He lend me his violin. Me, I'm selfish. I don't lend my violin to not a person. No, not even the King of England.

Den, too, Archie, his throat and lungs, and his physique, it is not strong, not robust. I take him hot country, warm California. He get strong.”

This last argument was too much for Archie's family. They yielded, and when Ventnor left for the West the boy went with him. He never missed a week writing home or to ”Hock,” and at the end of two years he returned.

In his pocket was a signed contract as ”first violin” in the finest orchestra of a great Southern city. He had left his cough with his short trousers in California, and had outgrown as much of his frailness as a boy of his temperament ever can. The day he left to fill his engagements the lady called who used to speak of him as ”poor Archie, he's such an expense to his parents,” and sat talking to Mrs. Anderson in the little parlor. Trig had just secured a ”situation,” and the caller was asking about it.