Storyteller.

Southern Cross, Volume 1, Issue 42, 13 January 1894, Page 13

Storyteller.

THE DEMON VIOLIN. The scene in Hooley’s saloon was not an uncommon one fox’ afar Northwestern town. It was late, and Jim Reagan, the night-shift, stood behind the bar. In front of it a couple of maudlin men, ixx blue overalls and jumpers, clasped each other in clumsy affection, talked loudly, and frequently ordered drinks of the stolid and indifferent Reagan. Within a door and behind a wooden partition were congregated thirty oi’ foi’ty men miners ranchers, ne ex—do-wells of the town, and a sprinkling of ‘'sure thing” •gamblers. Pour or five tables, like "magnets, held each its quota of players. Around theflooi 1 lay strewn the packs of rejected playing-cards like fallen leaves A piano, at one side of the room, gave out loud and discordant soun Is. The man performing upon it was flu -...-si striking figure in the room. -With . tattered "clothes, dishevelled haii-, and bleared eyes, he was distinctively different from any of his companions. The dark eyes and olive skin suggested birth in a southern «lime. Work in the mines or on the xanch was not indicated by the slight frame. The well-formed hands were not distorted by toil. Torn, and soiled* and rusty brown, as it was, his -suit of clothes had once been black—his coat, a frock. “Crazy Paolo” they called him. Wine, whisky, a little food, and a night’s lodging constituted his hire at Hooley’s to bang the miserable piano and play his violin —the violin so carefully locked in its case.

He .had finished a harrowing- popular air at the piano for the twentieth ■consecutive time, and stopped to take a drink from the glass at his elbow. Three or four big, hulking men near by stood looking at him stupidly from under their broad felt hats. The poker-chips clicked at the gamingtables. Reagan, in response lo an order, brought in a tray of liquor and cigars to one of the tables. Paolo reached for his case and almost reverently tcok out his violin. A little preliminary tuning and it went to Ids shoulder. The bow was drawn over the strings, but so softly that none save himself heard the sound. Again it glided over the instrument, und then it began to wander back nnd forth—now slowly, now swiftly, now tremulously. As the truant bars of favourite old operas, sad nocturnes and gay gavottes poured into his yearning ear, his face lit up with a strange joy. The vacant stare of the men near him changed to a dull curiosity. But the music was all for himself; it was only a moment's delicious communion with his violin he was having. Too well he knew that next would come a command to play some horrible song or dance. Buc the poker-chips still clicked, the men about him said nothing, and Paolo continued to play for the single auditor —himself.

With the music his thoughts uncon scion sly went back to Italy, hie and the little violin had never parted since leaving the little Palermo home. The old mother and (father had gone lung’ ago, and the father had loft him alii he had—the wonderful violin. Ah ! that was good of the old father, but Giovanni did not think so. Where was Giovanni P A wild boy was brother Giovanni. He did not like the father’s violin. It was the demon of the family, Giovanni said ; it had brought, and would bring, nothing but to them ; the old father had done nobbing but play it, jmd ho had lived in distress and died in poverty. It would have been better had be left Paolo bis curse than bis violin. As for Giovanni, be would have none of music; be would go way —anywhere—and be would become rich somehow. Yes, that was wbat be said. But Giovanni was not a musician—and a complacent smile stole over the lips of the pitiful wreck. Demon P Misfortune P islanders on his dear violin! Had

he not played to applauding thousands in Rome—in London —in New York ! She had come to hear him, it was true; but was it the dear violin’s fault that the dark-eyed actress, Whom he married, deceived him and ruined his life ? “ Here ! Paolo ! wake up there and play us so nothing lively,” came a rough, good-natured voice from behind the clouds of tobacco smoke. Just then a man came swaying into the room, a reckless, drunken determination on his face to assert himself in some boisterous way. He heard the command, looked sullenly towards Paolo, and then walked unsteadily to the piano. Suddenly he seized the violin, tore it from the player’s hands, and swinging it above his bead, brought it down upon the piano, smashing it to pieces. With a shriek like that of a wild and wounded animal, Paolo gave a bound and caught the man by the throat. It was all over in a moment; they were grappling on the floor together ; the man, drunk though lie was, felt that the hands strangling him were those of a maniac ; he managed to reach his pistol ; no one saw exactly how it was done, but the pistol was discharged and Paolo rose to his feet; the other was dead.

The pistol-shot, not the struggle on the floor, instantly brought everyone in the room up standing. They gathered excitedly around, but Paolo, with a Avail of grief, flung himself upon the piano and pressed the shattered violin to his heart. He kissed it and talked to it caressingly, pleadingly, ft did not seem that he knew he had killed a man. He only knew that his violin Avas dead —that it Avon Id speak to him no more. Soon the room Avas crowded, for the news spread quickly. The dead man lay stretched upon the floor, and the croAvd gazed morbidly upon him and then at the crazy Paolo hug’giug his violin. Presently the sheriff bustled in, and all made Avay for him. He picked up the pistol and laid it aside. Jim Reagan Avas the first to speak: “ Crazy Paolo killed him, sheriff, but he did it in self-defence.” ‘•That’s Avhat he did, sheriff,” came the popular Western phrase in unison from the croAvd. “ Who is he ?” asked the sheriff, bending over the prone figure. “ Stranger,” someone A r olunteered. The sheriff threAA r back the dead man’s coat and started to search the pockets. Ho soon held up an envelope and read aloud the name in the address : “ Giovanni Legardi ■” Paolo stood beside him and snatched the envelope from his hand. One glance at the name and a Avild glare at the croAvd that seemed to last a minute. The next instant he was on his knees, holding the face of his brother close to his OAvn and seeming to look tbrough it. Slowly he arose to his feet, Avith a despairing moan. Suddenly his eyes became idvetted upon an object. Before even one of the spell-bound croAvd had divined his intention, the forgotten pistol Avas in bis baud, and another bullet had claimed a life. Crazy Paolo fell heaA'ily to the floor, bis arm throAvn about Ids A'ictim in a half embrace. The fall shook the fragile building. The ruined violin dropped from the piano and lay beside the brothers. — Selected.