Orpheus in Mayfair, and Other Stories and Sketches

Part 1

Produced by Dagny; Emma Dudding; John Bickers

ORPHEUS IN MAYFAIR AND OTHER STORIES AND SKETCHES

MAURICE BARING

TO ETHEL SMYTH

NOTE

Most of the stories and sketches in this book have appeared in the Morning Post. One of them was published in the Westminster Gazette. I have to thank the editors and proprietors concerned for their kindness in allowing me to republish them.

CONTENTS

Orpheus in Mayfair The Cricket Match The Shadow of a Midnight Jean Francois The Flute of Chang Liang “What is Truth?” A Luncheon-Party Fete Galante The Garland The Spider’s Web Edward II. At Berkeley Castle The Island The Man Who Gave Good Advice Russalka The Old Woman Dr. Faust’s Last Day The Flute-Player’s Story A Chinaman on Oxford Venus The Fire The Conqueror The Ikon The Thief The Star Chun Wa

ORPHEUS IN MAYFAIR

Heraclius Themistocles Margaritis was a professional musician. He was a singer and a composer of songs; he wrote poetry in Romaic, and composed tunes to suit rhymes. But it was not thus that he earned his daily bread, and he was poor, very poor. To earn his livelihood he gave lessons, music lessons during the day, and in the evening lessons in Greek, ancient and modern, to such people (and these were rare) who wished to learn these languages. He was a young man, only twenty-four, and he had married, before he came of age, an Italian girl called Tina. They had come to England in order to make their fortune. They lived in apartments in the Hereford Road, Bayswater.

They had two children, a little girl and a little boy; they were very much in love with each other, as happy as birds, and as poor as church mice. For Heraclius Themistocles got but few pupils, and although he had sung in public at one or two concerts, and had not been received unfavourably, he failed to obtain engagements to sing in private houses, which was his ambition. He hoped by this means to become well known, and then to be able to give recitals of his own where he would reveal to the world those tunes in which he knew the spirit of Hellas breathed. The whole desire of his life was to bring back and to give to the world the forgotten but undying Song of Greece. In spite of this, the modest advertisement which was to be found at concert agencies announcing that Mr. Heraclius Themistocles Margaritis was willing to attend evening parties and to give an exhibition of Greek music, ancient and modern, had as yet met with no response. After he had been a year in England the only steps towards making a fortune were two public performances at charity matinees, one or two pupils in pianoforte playing, and an occasional but rare engagement for stray pupils at a school of modern languages.

It was in the middle of the second summer after his arrival that an incident occurred which proved to be the turning point of his career. A London hostess was giving a party in honour of a foreign Personage. It had been intimated that some kind of music would be expected. The hostess had neither the means nor the desire to secure for her entertainment stars of the first magnitude, but she gathered together some lesser lights--a violinist, a pianist, and a singer of French drawing-room melodies. On the morning of the day on which her concert was to be given, the hostess received a telegram from the singer of French drawing-room melodies to say that she had got a bad cold, and could not possibly sing that night. The hostess was in despair, but a musical friend of hers came to the rescue, and promised to obtain for her an excellent substitute, a man who sang Greek songs.

* * * * *

When Margaritis received the telegram from Arkwright’s Agency that he was to sing that night at A---- House, he was overjoyed, and could scarcely believe his eyes. He at once communicated the news to Tina, and they spent hours in discussing what songs he should sing, who the good fairy could have been who recommended him, and in building castles in the air with regard to the result of this engagement. He would become famous; they would have enough money to go to Italy for a holiday; he would give concerts; he would reveal to the modern world the music of Hellas.

About half-past four in the afternoon Margaritis went out to buy himself some respectable evening studs from a large emporium in the neighbourhood. When he returned, singing and whistling on the stairs for joy, he was met by Tina, who to his astonishment was quite pale, and he saw at a glance that something had happened.

“They’ve put me off!” he said. “Or it was a mistake. I knew it was too good to be true.”

“It’s not that,” said Tina, “it’s Carlo!” Carlo was their little boy, who was nearly four years old.

“What?” said Margaritis.

Tina dragged him into their little sitting-room. “He is ill,” she said, “very ill, and I don’t know what’s the matter with him.”

Margaritis turned pale. “Let me see him,” he said. “We must get a doctor.”

“The doctor is coming: I went for him at once,” she said. And then they walked on tiptoe into the bedroom where Carlo was lying in his cot, tossing about, and evidently in a raging fever. Half an hour later the doctor came. Margaritis and Tina waited, silent and trembling with anxiety, while he examined the child. At last he came from the bedroom with a grave face. He said that the child was very seriously ill, but that if he got through the night he would very probably recover.

“I must send a telegram,” said Margaritis to Tina. “I cannot possibly go.” Tina squeezed his hand, and then with a brave smile she went back to the sick-room.

Margaritis took a telegraph form out of a shabby leather portfolio, sat down before the dining-table on which the cloth had been laid for tea (for the sitting-room was the dining-room also), and wrote out the telegram. And as he wrote his tears fell on the writing and smudged it. His grief overcame him, and he buried his face in his hands and sobbed. “What the Fates give with one hand,” he thought to himself, “they take away with another!” Then he heard himself, he knew not why, invoking the gods of Greece, the ancient gods of Olympus, to help him. And at that moment the whole room seemed to be filled with a strange light, and he saw the wonderful figure of a man with a shining face and eyes that seemed infinitely sad and at the same time infinitely luminous. The figure held a lyre, and said to him in Greek:--

“It is well. All will be well. I will take your place at the concert!”

When the vision had vanished, the half written telegram on his table had disappeared also.

* * * * *

The party at A---- House that night was brilliant rather than large. In one of the drawing-rooms there was a piano, in front of which were six or seven rows of gilt chairs. The other rooms were filled with shifting groups of beautiful women, and men wearing orders and medals. There was a continuous buzz of conversation, except in the room where the music was going on; and even there in the background there was a subdued whispering. The violinist was playing some elaborate nothings, and displaying astounding facility, but the audience did not seem to be much interested, for when he stopped, after some faint applause, conversation broke loose like a torrent.

“I do hope,” said some one to the lady next him, “that the music will be over soon. One gets wedged in here, one doesn’t dare move, and one had to put up with having one’s conversation spoilt and interrupted.”

Part 2

“It’s an extraordinary thing,” answered the lady, “that nobody dares give a party in London without some kind of entertainment. It is such a mistake!”

At that moment the fourth and last item on the programme began, which was called “Greek Songs by Heraclius Themistocles Margaritis.”

“He certainly looks like a Greek,” said the lady who had been talking; “in fact if his hair was cut he would be quite good-looking.”

“It’s not my idea of a Greek,” whispered her neighbour. “He is too fair. I thought Greeks were dark.”

“Hush!” said the lady, and the first song began. It was a strange thread of sound that came upon the ears of the listeners, rather high and piercing, and the accompaniment (Margaritis accompanied himself) was twanging and monotonous like the sound of an Indian tom-tom. The same phrase was repeated two or three times over, the melody seemed to consist of only a very few notes, and to come over and over again with extraordinary persistence. Then the music rose into a high shrill call and ended abruptly.

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