Unfinished Portraits Part 13

Tieze drew back, half laughing, half alarmed.

"Franz! Franz!" he said.

The other brushed his hand across his forehead and drew a deep breath.

"Ja," he said slowly, "I might have killed you."

Tieze nodded. A look of curiosity held his face.

"It is schon!" he said softly. "Schon!"

Schubert turned abruptly.

"It is not for you.... For years I search that song, over mountains, in the storm, in the sunshine; but it has never come--till here." His eye swept the crowded place. "Now I have it"--he patted the rough coat pocket--"now I have it, I go away."

VI

The girl sitting on a rough bench by the low building stirred slightly.

She glanced behind her. Deep blackness in the wood, shifting moonshine about her. She breathed a quick sigh. It was like that other night. Ah, he would not come!

Her face fell forward into her slender fingers. She sat immovable. The shadow trembled a little, but the girl by the low house was blind and deaf. Melodies of the past were about her. The shadow moved, but she had no eyes to see; slowly it travelled across the short-cropped gra.s.s, mystically green and white in the waning moon. Noiselessly it came; it sank noiselessly into the shadow of the low house. A sound clicked and was still. But the girl had not moved--memory music held her. It moved upon her spirit, low and sweet, and stirred the pulse, and breathed itself away.

She stirred a little, and laid her cheek upon her palm. Her opened eyes rested carelessly on the ground; her look flashed wide and leaped to the lattice window beside her, and back again to the ground. A block of light lay there, clear and defined. It was not moonlight or dream-light.

She sprang to her feet and moved a step nearer the window. Then she stopped, her hand at her side, her breath coming quickly. The high, sweet notes were calling from the night. Swiftly she moved. The door gave lightly beneath her touch. She crossed the smooth floor. She was by his side. The music was around them, above them, shimmering. It held them close. Slowly he turned his big, homely face and looked at her, but the music did not cease. It hovered in the air above, high and pure and sweet. The face of the young countess bent lower; a look of tenderness waited in her subtle eyes.

He sprang to his feet, his hands outstretched to ward it off.

"Nein. It is not I. It is the music. You shall not be bewitched!" His hands made swift pa.s.ses, as if he would banish a spell.

She caught them to her and waited.

"Am I bewitched--Franz?" she said at last. The voice was very low. The laughing eyes were looking into his.

"Ja, you are bewitched," he returned stoutly.

"And you?"

"I have only love for you."

"And I have only love for you," she repeated softly. She hummed a bit of the melody and stopped, looking at him sweetly. "It is my song," she questioned--"the song you went to seek for me?"

He lifted his head proudly.

"It came for you."

She nodded with br.i.m.m.i.n.g eyes. Her hands stole softly up to the big face. They framed it in, with its look of pride, and touched it gently.

"Dear face!" she breathed, "dear ugly face--my music face!"

They moved swiftly apart. The figure of the count was in the open doorway.

She moved forward serenely and slipped her hand in his.

"I am here, Father Johann," she said quietly.

His fingers closed about the white ones.

"Go outside, Cara. Wait there till I come."

Her dark, troubled eyes looked into his. They were not laughing now.

"Nay, father," she said gently, "it is you who will wait outside--while we say farewell."

The count regarded her for a long moment, then he turned toward the young musician, his face full of compa.s.sion and a kind of envy.

"My friend," he said slowly, "for five minutes I shall leave her with you. You will go away--forever."

Schubert bowed proudly. His eyes were on the girl's face.

As the door closed, she turned to him, holding out her hands.

He took them in his, and they stood silent, looking into each other's eyes.

She drew a long breath.

"What do people say when they are dying?" she asked.

"Nein, I know not." His voice trembled.

"There is so much, and it is nothing," said the girl dreamily. She moved a step toward the piano, his hands locked fast in hers. "Tell me again you love me!" she whispered.

He took off the great spectacles, and laid them beside the scrawled page.

"Look in my eyes," he said gently. A kind of grandeur had touched the homely features. The soul behind them looked out.

She bent toward him. A little sob broke from her lips. She lifted the hands and moved them swiftly toward the keys.

"Tell me!" she said.

With a smile of sadness, he obeyed the gesture.

Melody filled the room. It flooded the moonlight. The count, pacing back and forth, halted, a look of bewilderment in his face. He stepped swiftly toward the door.

The lights on the piano flared uncertainly. They fell on the figure at the piano. It loomed grotesque and grim, and melted away in flickering shadow. Music played about it. Strains of sadness swept over it in the gloom and drifted by, and the sweet, high notes rose clear. A little distance away the figure of the young countess stood in the shifting light. Her clasped hands hung before her. She swayed and lifted them, groping, and turned. Her father sprang to her. Side by side they pa.s.sed into the night. The music sounded about them far and sweet.