The Project Gutenberg EBook of Maurice Guest, by Henry Handel Richardson

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Title: Maurice Guest

Author: Henry Handel Richardson

Posting Date: June 20, 2009 [EBook #3727]
Release Date: February, 2003
First Posted: August 10, 2001

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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MAURICE GUEST

by

Henry Handel Richardson

Part I

S'amor non e che dunque e quel ch'io sento?
Ma s'egli e amor, per Dio, che cosa e quale?

PETRARCH

I.

One noon in 189-, a young man stood in front of the new Gewandhaus in
Leipzig, and watched the neat, grass-laid square, until then white and
silent in the sunshine, grow dark with many figures.

The public rehearsal of the weekly concert was just over, and, from the
half light of the warm-coloured hall, which for more than two hours had
held them secluded, some hundreds of people hastened, with renewed
anticipation, towards sunlight and street sounds. There was a medley of
tongues, for many nationalities were represented in the crowd that
surged through the ground-floor and out of the glass doors, and much
noisy ado, for the majority was made up of young people, at an age that
enjoys the sound of its own voice. In black, diverging lines they
poured through the heavy swinging doors, which flapped ceaselessly to
and fro, never quite closing, always opening afresh, and on descending
the shallow steps, they told off into groups, where all talked at once,
with lively gesticulation. A few faces had the strained look that
indicates the conscientious listener; but most of these young musicians
were under the influence of a stimulant more potent than wine, which
manifested itself in a nervous garrulity and a nervous mirth.

They hummed like bees before a hive. Maurice Guest, who had come out
among the first, lingered to watch a scene that was new to him, of
which he was as yet an onlooker only. Here and there came a member of
the orchestra; with violin-case or black-swathed wind-instrument in
hand, he deftly threaded his way through the throng, bestowing, as he
went, a hast