Visionaries Part 22

Pobloff no longer asked himself what it meant; he was become a maniac, pursued by deathless devils. He could have flown to the end of the universe in this Ballade; but, at last, his heart cracking, head bursting, face livid, overtaken by the Footsteps of the Missing, he smashed both fists upon the keys and fell forward despairingly....

... The gigantic, noseless negro, the grand vizier himself, sternly regarded the prince, who stood, torch in hand, near the shattered pianoforte. The dumb spoke:--

"Let us hope, Exalted Highness, that your masquerades and mystifications are over forever. To-day's prankish sport may put us to trouble for a satisfactory explanation." He waved his hand vaguely in the direction of the prostrate composer. "And hasheesh sometimes maddens for a lifetime!"

He lightly touched the drugged Pobloff with his enormous foot.

The youthful runaway ashamedly lowered his head--in reality he adored music with all the fulness of his cruel, faunlike nature.

XV

THE CURSORY LIGHT

To this day Pinton could never explain why he looked out of that pantry window. He had reached his home in a hungry condition. He was tired and dead broke, so he had resolved to forage. He had listened for two or three, perhaps five, minutes in the hall of his boarding-house; then he went, soft-footed, to Mrs. Hallam's pantry on the second floor. He was sure that it was open, he was equally sure that it contained something edible on its hospitable shelves. Ah! who has not his bread at midnight stolen, ye heavenly powers, ye know him not!

Pinton, however, knew one thing, and that was a ravenous desire to sink his teeth into pie, custard, or even bread. He felt with large, eager hands along the wall on the pantry side. With feverish joy he touched the k.n.o.b--a friendly k.n.o.b, despite its cold, distant glaze--of the door he sought.

Pinton gave a tug, and then his heart stopped beating. The door was locked. Something like a curse, something like a prayer, rose to his lips, and his arms fell helplessly to his side.

Mrs. Hallam, realizing that it was Sat.u.r.day night--the predatory night of the week--had secured her pastry, her confitures, her celebrated desserts; and so poor Pinton, all his sweet teeth furiously aching, his mouth watering, stood on the hither side of Paradise, a baffled peri in pantaloons!

After a pause, full of pain and troublous previsions of a restless, discontented night, Pinton grew angry and pulled at the k.n.o.b of the door, thinking, perhaps, that it might abate a jot of its dignified resistance. It remained immovable, grimly antagonistic, until his fingers grew hot and cold as they touched a bit of cold metal.

The key in the lock! In a second it was turned, and the hungry one was within and restlessly searching and fumbling for food. He felt along the lower shelves and met apples, oranges, and sealed bottles containing ruined, otherwise miscalled preserved, fruit. He knelt on the dresser and explored the upper shelf. Ah, here was richness indeed! Pies, pies, cakes, pies, frosted cakes, cakes sweating golden, fruity promises, and cakes as icy as the hand of charity. Pinton was happy, glutton that he was, and he soon filled the pockets of his overcoat. What Mrs. Hallam might say in the morning he cared not. Let the galled jade wince, his breakfast appet.i.te would be unwrung; and then he started violently, lost his balance, and almost fell to the floor.

Opposite him was the window of the pantry, which faced the wall of the next house. Pinton had never been in the pantry by daylight, so he was rudely shocked by the glance of a light--a cursory, moving light. It showed him a window in the other house and a pair of stairs. It flickered about an old bal.u.s.ter and a rusty carpet, it came from below, it mounted upward and was lost to view.

The burglar of pies, the ravisher of cakes, was almost shocked by this unexpected light. He watched it dancing fantastically on the discoloured wall of the house; he wondered--ill at ease--if it would flash in his face. His surmise was realized, for a streak of illumination reached the narrow chamber in which he cowered, and then he was certain some one was looking at him. He never budged, for he was too frightened. Suddenly the light vanished and a head was dimly silhouetted in the window opposite.

It nodded to Pinton. Pinton stared stupidly, and the head disappeared.

The hungry man, his appet.i.te now gone, was numb and terrified.

What did it mean, who was the man? A detective, or a friend of Mrs.

Hallam's in a coign from which the plunderers of her pantry could be noted? Beady repentance stood out on Pinton's forehead.

And the light came back. This time it was intelligible, for it was a lantern in the hand of a young man of about thirty. His face was open and smiling. He wore his hair rather long for an American, and it was blond and curling.

He surveyed Pinton for a moment, then he said, in a most agreeable voice:--

"What luck, old pal?"

Pinton dropped his pies, slammed the window, and got to his bedroom as fast as his nervous legs could carry him. He undressed in a nightmare, and did not sleep until the early summer sun shot hot shafts of heat into his chamber.

With a shamed Sabbath face he arose, dressed, and descended to his morning meal. Mrs. Hallam was sitting in orotund silence, but seemed in good humour. She asked him casually if he had enjoyed his Sat.u.r.day evening, and quite as casually d.a.m.ned the wandering cats that had played havoc in her pantry. She remarked that leaving windows open was a poor practice, even if hospitable in appearance, and nervous Mr. Pinton drank his coffee in silent a.s.sent and then hurried off to the church where he trod the organ pedals for a small salary's sake.

The following Friday was rehearsal night, and the organist left his choir in a bad humour. His contralto had not attended, and as she was the only artiste and the only good-looking girl of the lot, Pinton took it into his head to become jealous. She had not paid the slightest attention to him, so he could not attribute her absence to a personal slight; but he felt aggrieved and vaguely irritated.

Pinton's musicians.h.i.+p was not profound. He had begun life as an organ salesman. He manipulated the cabinet organ for impossible customers in Wisconsin, and he came to New York because he was offered a better chance.

The inevitable church position occurred. Then came Zundel voluntaries and hard pedal practice. At last Mendelssohn's organ sonatas were reached and with them a call--organists, like pastors, have calls--to a fas.h.i.+onable church. The salary was fair and Mr. Pinton grew side-whiskers.

He heard Paderewski play Chopin, and became a crazy lover of the piano.

He hired a small upright and studied finger exercises. He consulted a thousand books on technic, and in the meantime could not play Czerny's velocity studies.

He grew thin, and sought the advice of many pianists. He soon found that pressing your foot on the swell and pulling couplers for tone colour were not the slightest use in piano playing. Subtle finger pressures, the unloosening of the muscles, the delicate art of _nuance_, the art unfelt by many organists, all were demanded of the pianist, and Pinton almost despaired.

He grew contemptuous of the king of instruments as he essayed the C major invention of Bach. He sneered at stops and pedals, and believed, in his foolish way, that all polyphony was bound within the boards of the Well-Tempered Clavichord. Then the new alto came to the choir, and Pinton--at being springtide, when the blood is in the joyful mood--thought that he was in love. He was really athirst.

This Friday evening he was genuinely disappointed and thirsty. He turned with a sinking heart and parched throat into Pop Pusch's dearly beloved resort. Earlier in his life he had often solaced himself with the free lunch that John, the melancholy waiter, had dispensed. Pinton's mind was a prey to many emotions as he entered the famous old place. He sat down before a brown table and clamoured for amber beer.

He was not alone at the table. As Pinton put the gla.s.s of Pilsner to his lips he met the gaze of two sardonic eyes. He could not finish his gla.s.s. He returned the look of the other man and then arose, with a nervous jerk that almost upset the table.

"Sit down, old pal; don't be crazy. I'll never say a word. Sit down, you fool; don't you see people are looking at you?"

The voice was low, kindly in intonation, but it went through Pinton like a saw biting its way into wood.

He sat down all in a heap. He knew the eyes; he knew the voice. It was the owner of the dark lantern--the mysterious man in the other house of that last Sat.u.r.day night. Pinton felt as if he were about to become ill.

"Lord, but you are a nervous one!" said the other, most rea.s.suringly.

"Sit still and I'll order brandy. It will settle your stomach."

That brought Pinton to his senses at once.

"No, no, I'll be all right in a moment," he said rather huskily. "I never drink spirits. Thank you, all the same."

"Don't mention it," said the man, and he tossed off his Wurzburger. Each man stealthily regarded the other. Pinton saw the stranger of the lantern and staircase. Close by he was handsome and engaging. His hair was worn like a violin virtuoso's, and his hands were white, delicate, and well cared for. He spoke first.

"How did you make out on that job?--I don't fancy there was much in it.

Boarding-houses, you know!"

Pinton, every particle of colour leaving his flabby face, asked:--

"What job?"

The stranger looked at him keenly and went on rather ironically:--

"You are the most nervous duck I ever ran across. When I saw you last your pocket was full of the silver plate of that pantry, and I can thank you for a fright myself, for when I saw you, I was just getting ready to crack a neat little crib. Say! why didn't you flash your glim at me or make some friendly signal at least? You popped out of sight like a prairie rabbit when a coyote heaves in view."

Pinton felt the ground heave beneath him. What possible job could the man mean? What was a "glim," and what did the fellow suggest by silver plate? Then it struck him all of a sudden. Heavens! he was taken for a burglar by a burglar. His presence in the pie pantry had been misinterpreted by a cracksman; and he, the harmless organist of Dr.

Bulgerly's church, was claimed as the a.s.sociate of a dangerous, perhaps notorious, thief. Pinton's cup of woe overflowed.

He arose, put on his hat, and started to go. The young man grasped his arm, and said in a most conciliatory fas.h.i.+on:--

"Perhaps I have hurt your sensitive nature. It was far from my intention to do so. I saluted you at first in the coa.r.s.e, conventional manner which is expected by members of our ancient and honourable craft, and if I have offended you, I humbly beg your pardon."