Kabanata Kabanata 5 · 第5章

SCENE: a city composed of one department store and three houses, on the

forbidding shores of Newfoundland.

TIME: one of those times when a fellow needs a friend,--when he's in a

stern, strange land on pleasure bent--and has to have a check cashed. I

don't know why it is that one always runs out of ready money in

Newfoundland. Perhaps because salmon flies are such fleeting creatures

of a day that you must send many postal orders to St. Johns for more.

Perhaps because the customs officials at Port au Basques make you

deposit so much duty on your fishing tackle. At any rate, there I was

penniless, with the burly storekeeper scowling in a savage manner at my

check and not knowing at all whether to take a chance on it. Finally he

thought he wouldn't, but conceded that I might spend a night under his

roof, as there was really nowhere else to go.

At this pass something made me think of music. Perhaps it was the parlor

piano which, when new, back in the stone age, had probably been in tune.

I inquired whether there were any other instruments. The wreckage of a

violin was produced. With two pieces of string and a table fork I set up

the prostrate sound-post. I glued together the bridge and put it in

position. The technique of the angler proved helpful in splicing

together some strange-looking strings. The A was eked out with a piece

of salmon leader, while an old mandolin yielded a wire E.

When all was at last ready, a fresh difficulty occurred to me. The

violin was an instrument which I had never learned to play! But

necessity is the mother of pretension. I thought of that check. And

placing the small fiddle carefully between my knees, I pretended that it

was a 'cello.

So the daughter of the house seated herself at the relic of the stone

age, and we had a concert. Newfoundland appeared not to be over-finicky

in the matter of pitch and tone-quality. And how it did enjoy music! As

the audience was of Scotch-English-Irish descent, we rendered equal

parts of 'Comin' Through the Rye,' 'God Save the King,' and 'Kathleen

Mavourneen.' Then the proprietor requested the Sextette from _Lucia_.

While it was forthcoming he toyed furtively with his bandana. When it

ceased he encored it with all his might. Then he slipped out storewards

and presently returned with the fattest, blackest, most

formidable-looking cigar I ever saw, which he gravely proffered me.

'We like' he remarked in his quaint idiom, 'to hear music at scattered

times.' He was trying to affect indifference. But his gruff voice shook,

and I knew then that music hath charms to cash the savage check.