Tales from Bohemia | Page 9

food, but for your society. But do you know what you did when
you ran against me at the corner? For a long time I've been trying to
recall a certain tune that I heard once. Three minutes ago, as I was
walking along, it came back to me, and I was whistling it when you
came up. You knocked it quite out of mind. I'm sorry, for interesting
circumstances connected with my first hearing of it make it desirable
that I should remember it."
"I can never express my regret," I said. "But you may be able to catch it
again. Where were you when it came back to you three minutes ago?"
"Two blocks away, passing a church. I think it was the shining of the
electric light upon the stained glass window that brought it back to me,
for on the night of the day when I first heard it in Paris a strong light
was falling upon the stained glass windows of the church opposite the
house in which I had apartments."
"Perhaps, then," I suggested, "the law of association may operate again
if you take the trouble to walk back and repass the church in the same
manner and the same state of mind, as nearly as you can resume them."

"By Jove," said the doctor, who likes experiments of this kind, "I'll try
it. Wait for me here."
I stood at the corner while the doctor briskly retraced his steps. His
firmly built, comfortable-looking form passed rapidly away. Within
five minutes he was back, a triumphant smile lighting his face.
"Success!" he said. "I have it, although whether from chance or as a
result of repeating my impression of light falling on a church window I
can't say. Certainly, after all these years, the tune is again mine.
Listen."
As we proceeded up the street the doctor whistled a few measures
composing a rather peculiar melody, expressive, it seemed to me, of
unrest. I never forget a tune I have once heard, and this one was soon
fixed in my memory.
"And the interesting circumstances under which you heard it?" I
interrogated. "Surely after the concern I've shown in the matter, you're
not going to deprive me of the story that goes with the tune?"
"There is no reason why I should. But I hope you will not circulate the
melody. It is the music that accompanies a tragedy."
"Indeed? You have written one, then? It must be brief, as there isn't
much of the music."
"I refer to a tragedy which actually occurred. Tragedies in real life are
not, as a rule, accompanied by music, and, to be accurate, in this case
music preceded the tragedy. Ten years ago, when I was living in Paris,
apartments adjoining mine were taken by a musician and his wife. His
name, as I learned afterward, was Heinrich Spellerberg, and he came
from Breslau. The wife, a very young and pretty creature, showed
herself, by her attire and manners, to be frivolous and vain, and without
having more than the slightest acquaintance with the pair, I soon
learned that she had no knowledge of or taste for music. He had
married her, I suppose, for her beauty, and had too late discovered the
incompatibility of their temperaments. But he loved her passionately
and jealously. One day I heard loud words between them, from which I
gathered unintentionally that something had aroused his jealousy. She
replied with laughter and taunts to his threats. The quarrel ended with
her abrupt departure from the room and from the house.
"He did not follow her, but sat down at the piano and began to play in
the manner of one who improvises. Correcting the melody that first

responded to his touch, modifying it at several repetitions, he
eventually gave out the form that I have just whistled.
"Evening came and the wife did not return. He continued to play that
strain over and over, into the night. I dropped my book, turned down
my lamp light, and stood at the window, looking at the church across
the way. Suddenly the music ceased. The wife had returned. 'Where did
you dine?' I heard him ask. I could not hear her reply, but the next
speech was plainly distinguished. 'You lie!' he said, in vehement tone
of rage; 'you were with ----.' I did not catch the name he mentioned, nor
did I know what she said in answer, or actually what happened. I heard
only a confused sound, which did not impress me at the time as
indicating a struggle, and which was followed by silence. I imagined
that harmony or a sullen truce had been restored in the household, and
thought no more about the affair. The next morning the wife was found