[Illustration: Music, JOACHIM, RAFF. _Op._ 177.]
"Make yourself quite easy, Herr Concertmeister. No child that was left to my charge was ever known to come to harm."
Thus Frau Schmidt to Eugen, as she stood with dubious smile and folded arms in our parlor, and harangued him, while he and I stood, violin-cases in our hands, in a great hurry, and anxious to be off.
"You are very kind, Frau Schmidt, I hope he will not trouble you."
"He is a well-behaved child, and not nearly so disagreeable and bad to do with as most. And at what time will you be back?"
"That is uncertain. It just depends upon the length of the probe."
"Ha! It is all the same. I am going out for a little excursion this afternoon, to the Grafenberg, and I shall take the boy with me."
"Oh, thank you," said Eugen; "that will be very kind. He wants some fresh air, and I've had no time to take him out. You are very kind."
"Trust to me, Herr Concertmeister--trust to me," said she, with the usual imperial wave of her hand, as she at last moved aside from the door-way which she had blocked up and allowed us to pass out. A last wave of the hand from Eugen to Sigmund, and then we hurried away to the station. We were bound for Cologne, where that year the Lower Rhine Musikfest was to be held. It was then somewhat past the middle of April, and the fest came off at Whitsuntide, in the middle of May. We, among others, were engaged to strengthen the Cologne orchestra for the occasion, and we were bidden this morning to the first probe.
We just caught our train, seeing one or two faces of comrades we knew, and in an hour were in Köln.
"The Tower of Babel," and Raff's Fifth Symphonie, that called "Lenore," were the subjects we had been summoned to practice. They, together with Beethoven's "Choral Fantasia" and some solos were to come off on the third evening of the fest.
The probe lasted a long time; it was three o'clock when we left the concert-hall, after five hours' hard work.
"Come along, Eugen," cried I, "we have just time to catch the three-ten, but only just."
"Don't wait for me," he answered, with an absent look. "I don't think I shall come by it. Look after yourself, Friedel, and _auf wiedersehen_!"
I was scarcely surprised, for I had seen that the music had deeply moved him, and I can understand the wish of any man to be alone with the remembrance or continuance of such emotions. Accordingly I took my way to the station, and there met one or two of my Elberthal comrades, who had been on the same errand as myself, and, like me, were returning home.