In bad company

EPILOGUE

Three years passed.
A large audience gathered, at the Kiev "Contracts", [ The "Contracts", let us remind the reader, was the local term for the Kiev Fair.] to hear a remarkable new musician. Blind, he was; yet rumour carried the most fantastic tales of his musical talent, and of his history. He came of a wealthy family, it was said, but a band of blind beggars had stolen him from his home when he was still a child, and he had wandered with them about the countryside until, one day, a famed professor had chanced upon him and discovered his wonderful talent. Or—as others told the tale—he had left home of his own will, and joined this beggar band for some romantic reason. Be that as it might, the hall was full to capacity, and the takings (appropriated to charitable purposes unknown to the audience) complete.
Deep silence fell as a young man came forward on the platform. His face was pale, his eyes dark and beautiful. It would have been hard to believe that he was blind, had not those dark eyes been so fixed, and had he not been guided by a fair-haired young lady—his wife, as many said.
"No wonder he makes such an impression," some sceptic whispered, in the hall. "His very looks are so dramatic!"
That was so. The musician's pale face, with its look of meditative attention, his unmoving eyes, his entire aspect aroused the expectation of something unusual, something altogether out of the ordinary.
They are all lovers of their native melodies—our southern folk; and even this miscellaneous "Contracts" audience was carried away from the first by the musician's tremendous sincerity. He played no set piece—simply what came into his heart and mind. And through this improvisation breathed his vivid feeling for Nature, his sensitive ties with the direct sources of folk melody. Plastic, melodious, rich in colour, the music came pouring forth into the hall—now swelling into a majestic anthem, now sinking into gentle, pensive melancholy. At times, it would be a thunderstorm, rolling across the heavens, echoing out into space; at times—the soft steppe, swaying the grass on some old burial mound, bringing dim dreams of times long past.
When the last note died away, a storm of frenzied applause broke over the huge hall. And the blind musician sat with bowed head, listening wonderingly to the clamour. But then, once more, he raised his hands and brought them down upon the keys. In an instant, the din was hushed.
It was at this point that Maxim came in. Searchingly, he looked into the faces of the audience. And in all these myriad faces he found the same emotion, the same eager, burning gaze, fixed on the blind musician.
Maxim sat listening—and waiting. He knew so well, more than any other in the hall, the human drama that lay behind this music. At any moment, he feared, this improvisation that poured so freely, with such compelling power, from the musician's very soul, might break off suddenly, as it had so often in the past, on a note of strained and painful questioning, revealing some new wound in the player's heart. But the music continued, rising, strengthening, ever fuller and more powerful, complete master of the welded, tensely listening crowd.
And, as Maxim sat listening, he began to distinguish more and more clearly a something very familiar in the music.
Yes, that was it. The clamour of the street. A great wave rolling, rolling—bright, thunderous, alive—to break, sparkling into a thousand separate sounds; now swelling, rising, now sinking again into a distant, but incessant murmur—calm, unimpassioned, cold, indifferent.
And suddenly Maxim's heart contracted. Again, as in the past, a moan had broken into the music.
A moan broke in, and filled the hall, and died away. And again came the clamour of life, sounding ever clearer, brighter, stronger—mobile, sparkling, joyous, full of light.
No, this was not the old moan of private, selfish grief, of blind suffering and torment. Tears rose to Maxim's eyes. And he saw tears in the eyes of those around him.
"He's learned to see. Yes, that's the truth. He's learned to see," Maxim whispered to himself.
Through lively, vivid melodies, joyous, carefree, unrestrained as the wind in the steppes; through the sweeping, manifold din of life; through folk songs, wistful or solemn, there came again and again, with increasing urgency and power, a new, soul-rending note.
"So, so, dear boy," Maxim silently approved. "Overtake them in the hour of merriment and rejoicing."
Another moment—and the blind beggars' chant hung alone—all-powerful, all-absorbing—over the vast hall, over the spellbound throng.
"Alms for the blind.... Alms, in Christ's name."
But this was no mere plea for alms, no pitiful wail, drowned in the din of the streets. It carried all that it had held for Pyotr in those past days when he had fled from the piano, with distorted features, at its sound—unable to endure its bitter pain. Now, he had conquered this pain in his soul; and he conquered the hearts of all these people by the power of its truth, profound, appalling. It was black night against the background of bright day, a reminder of sorrow amid the very fullness of joy.
It was as though a thunderbolt had broken over the throng. Every heart trembled, as though the musician's swift fingers were pulling at its strings. The music ceased—but the people sat unmoving. A death-like silence filled the hall.
"Yes, he's learned to see," Maxim told himself, bowing his head. "In place of the old suffering—blind, selfish, not to be allayed—he carries now in his soul a true knowledge of life. He has come to know other people's sorrows, and other people's joys. He's learned to see, and he'll be able, now, to remind the fortunate of the less fortunate."
And the old soldier's head bowed lower still. He, too, then, had done his work in this world. He had not lived in vain. That was the message that the music bore him—this powerful, soul-commanding music, filling the hall, ruling the throng.

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Such was the debut of the blind musician.

1886-1898
VLADIMIR KOROLENKO