Hede: Part One

I

HEDE FREY was a genius. A good many people thought all the Frey children geniuses. And why should n’t they be? Their mother and father were first cousins, and, when first cousins married, their children were always either one extreme or the other. But almost never were they anything in between.

Right away, when they were little, the Frey children began to be geniuses. And Adam Frey, their father, was nothing but a tailor, and their mother, Lise, took in washings. Of course, they were good people, Adam and Lise were, but nothing to brag about for brains. Why, they did n’t ever once find out for themselves that their children were geniuses; somebody else always had to do that. And even when someone had told them so, — someone who knew, too, — Adam and Lise looked as if they did n’t believe and nodded their heads and shook them and smiled shyly. First, there was Tina on the piano, and then Wolfgang with his singing, and last of all Hede — Hede and her violin. Not until Hede did Adam and Lise believe for sure, but with her they did, and worked and slaved for their believing.

Maybe it was because Tina was so pretty and so hot-tempered, so good sometimes and so wicked other times, that they could not truly believe about her, and maybe they could not believe that way about Wolfgang because he was only lazy and delightful. But with Hede it was different. Hede was not pretty at all in any way, and when she was little they called her Stoffel because she was so clumsy and did n’t say much and was all the time only serious and busy. When she began to grow up, though, then Adam and Lise began to see; and once Adam and Lise could see, then was there no going backward, nor any doubting.

To be sure, Tina and Wolfgang, they had their lessons and good teachers, and when they did well Adam and Lise were proud and pleased, but never once did they let themselves in for disappointment with false hopes or with expecting too much of these two. And when Tina was grown up she was a good pianist, and everywhere at recitals she was asked to play, and always on the programme her name came last, which is where the best ones are. But one day she met a young man who was goodlooking and full of enticing ways and a drinker and a spendthrift, and she ran away with him and got married and Adam and Lise did not hear from her for a long time — not until, thin and fierce-Iooking, she came home with her baby, hating her husband who had deserted her. No longer did she play much after that, only at odd times when her heart was a stone inside of her and she would not give in. But at such times she played as never before, and when the family in their working heard her they were silent and sometimes afraid. ‘ Only a miracle,’ thought Adam and Lise, ‘can save her now.’ And when that miracle came, it was death. Tina died in the influenza epidemic, and her mother and father cared for her little girl.

Wolfgang, he turned out to be nothing — only popular and good-natured. When the time came for such things, he learned a trade and sang at his work and got married to a nice girl who bore him many little girls and, at last, a boy. And in singing to all his little ones Wolfgang found all of himself that there was to find, and Adam and Lise were well content.

II

But with Hede it was different. Hede was a genius, and by the time she was fifteen there was nobody left in Naples who could teach her anything about the violin. But Hede was patient and kept on taking lessons just the same, and working hard and being quiet. At this time Hede was very plain, almost ugly. Her hair was straight and stringy and she had to wear glasses, but because she did not have much of a nose, and because she perspired so freely, they were always sliding down and she did not care at all about her appearance. She was quite short and thickset, and her arms and her hands met in a wrinkle, and her legs and her feet the same. But her muscles were hard and firm — in her arms and hands from holding and playing the violin, and in her legs and feet from standing to practise. But no one ever knew what was going on inside of Hede. Even Adam and Lise and Wolfgang could not tell from talking with her what she was thinking and what was in her heart. But they knew the fullness of her silence and believed in it and respected it. And then Hede learned that Nolte was to come to this country.

She was sitting in the kitchen eating her breakfast with the morning paper open beside her. Her mother was bending over her tubs in the laundry, which was the next room to the kitchen. They were alone in the house.

‘Hey, Mom!’ called Hede in her deep, slow voice.

’Yes — what is it, Hede?’ asked her mother, pausing in her washing and brushing the hair out of her eyes with the back of one wet hand.

‘Nolte’s coming here next fall — to Boston.’

‘Well?’ said her mother, waiting to be enlightened.

Hede got up and, with the newspaper in her hand, walked to the door of the laundry.

‘You know, Mom,’ she said without taking her eyes from the paper, ‘you know — Andreas Nolte, the one who made Dolmetsch and Pfeiffer and Pia Froschel!’

A slow comprehending dawned on Lise’s face.

’O-oh, Nolle, he is coming — I see!’ She nodded her head.

‘He’s giving master classes at the Conservatory,’ Hede went on.

Lise bent over her tubs again and there was a long silence, broken only by the sound of sudsy water and the crackling of the newspaper as Hede scanned the rest of the news. At last Lise looked up once more, this time not at Hede, but out of the window to where her lines and lines of spotless linen hung drying in the spring wind.

‘Well, Hede,’ she said, ‘to-night I will talk to your father.’

Without saying a word, Hede turned back into the kitchen and folded the paper, quite deftly for her, and went into the front room where the piano was and where she practised, and closed the door. Lise listened to hear her tune up, but for several minutes there was no sound.

‘Maybe she is doing her harmony first to-day,’ thought Lise and went on with her work.

But in the front room Hede was weeping, weeping truly for the first time.

III

In the world of the violinist there was but one Nolte. And he had come all the way to America out of his native Bavaria to give master classes. It was unheard of. Everywhere all over the world those who knew him, when they heard of it, could not believe it. Nolte? In America? Could this be the Andreas Nolte that they knew? The same one who was known never to venture farther afield than Munich? The same one to whom the whole musical world came as did Mahomet to the mountain? It was beyond belief; the old fellow must be in his dotage. How else could it be? For Nolte, who was far from being a young man, to surrender his magnificent prestige, and for America at that — that upstart nation of new gold and of philistines! What, what was the world coming to?

But it was precisely for that new gold that Nolte had yielded and come. The war had been no kinder to him than to his colleagues. And so, early in the autumn of 1920, in the company of his incomparable assistant, Fräulein Wiener, and for the first time in his life, Andreas Nolte set foot on a boat — to come to America. In that autumn, too, Hede Frey passed her seventeenth birthday.

But on one score Nolte remained adamant. He would give his master classes, he would collect his handsome fees, but he would give no private instruction. Yes, he knew one could demand any price in this amazing country, and get it, too; no fee was unreasonable for even so little as fifteen minutes under the personal supervision of the titanic Nolte. But although he may have sacrificed his pride, his Old World prestige, yet Nolte cherished his independence. No, never would he subject himself to the torture of listening to the vile sawing of any American fiddler — not he, he who had made Dolmetsch and Pfeiffer and Pia Froschel!

Pia Froschel, that darling! At seventeen she had played before every crowned head in Europe, — and there were still crowned heads then, — and the music-lovers of six continents had acclaimed her wizardry and skill. The little mouse! And he, Nolte, had made it all possible.

Yet life in Boston was not altogether unpleasant, and every week, almost every day, there were invitations from New York, from Philadelphia, from Chicago, from every great city in this vast country. Nolte liked it, too — this glory, this acclamation. Oh, he had been wise, he had been wise to do this! Let his old colleagues taunt him. ‘Pride goeth before a fall.’ He knew now what that oft-quoted adage meant, and he knew truly.

Wiener, yes, Wiener — she might well get homesick, for who had ever heard of poor Wiener? She had given up everything — her very identity even — to live in the great man’s shadow. But she was a good girl, Wiener; Nolte did not know what he would do without her now. Yes, he must take her with him more — among the great, that is; he must see to it that they paid her some attention, too, for she could have made a name for herself as easily as not. But she had chosen otherwise, poor old Wiener. Good Wiener.

But if only they would stop pestering him about private lessons! Why, he had to make a rule that no one in his classes should leave the lecture room until five minutes after he himself had gone out. And he had made Wiener stay there to enforce it. But if he could not get a taxi right away, there they were at his heels, clamoring for lessons. They would pay anything, anything! And when they could not find him, then it was Wiener that they bothered. They even made Wiener give them lessons — and gave her twenty dollars an hour. Ach, these Americans!

As if it were not enough that they should clamor so after his lessons, they seduced Wiener finally into doing it. And when Wiener hounded him, then was everything up.

’Ach, Maestro, just this once . . . please, for me . . . there is talent there, I know. . . . But, Maestro, if only once I see it tires you, frets you, I promise ... I give my word, Maestro, I send them away and no more do they come back, no more . . .’

And so he gave in. The mighty Nolte was in the end overridden — and by none other than Wiener. Wiener, who until this moment for so many, many years had followed him about like a faithful dog, had been always meek and docile, had seen only to his wants and their gratification, had never thought of crossing him — she it was who had, at the last, betrayed him. Ach, these Americans — they had twisted his Wiener around their little fingers!

Well, he would make a compromise. No, Nolte never compromised — he would issue an ultimatum. He would give auditions to three.

‘Mind, Wiener, only three! And send to me only the very best or — ja, Wiener, you know! Too, they must play only solid things, no murdering cadenzas, no —’

’Ja, Maestro, aber ja, natürlich!’

Nolte sighed as Wiener left the room. He clenched his fists and ground his teeth. He wished Wiener were dead.

IV

Nolte was in a bad humor on the morning scheduled for the auditions. He was feeling at his most perverse. He wanted to knock Wiener down and then to kick her. He wanted to go back on his word, to cancel the auditions, but he did not quite dare. After all, he would probably have to spend the rest of his days with Wiener. So he smiled grimly and helped himself generously to cognac and sat down to wait for Wiener’s trio of talent.

Promptly at eleven Wiener beat her ridiculous tattoo on his door and, as usual, opened without waiting for an answer. That made Nolte angry all over again. Why, um Gottes willen, did that woman trouble to knock so long as she intended to walk right in anyway?

‘Well?’ he bellowed at Wiener’s smiling face, and glowered.

Wiener closed the door noiselessly behind her and advanced hesitantly.

’Die drei, Maestro, sie sind draussen.‘ There was anticipation, a bright excitement, in her voice.

For answer Nolte rose and walked over to a window, still glowering. His lower lip was thrust out and as far upward as it would go.

‘ Na, worauf wartst du denn?’ he barked at her over his shoulder.

‘I only wanted to know, Maestro, if you are ready,’ answered the longsuffering Wiener.

Nolte would not give in, he could not. He nodded his head vaguely and grunted affirmatively. Wiener bit her lip to keep from laughing outright at his feeble deception and walked back to the door. She beckoned to someone outside.

‘Come in,’ she whispered.

A squat figure slipped inside, carrying under her left arm a violin and in her right hand a bow. Wiener pointed out the bristling back at the far side of the room and laid one finger across her lips. Then she indicated the spot where the girl should stand and motioned her to tune up. The girl shook her head; she had tuned up outside. But she drew the bow once across the strings firmly and quietly. A perceptible shudder was all Nolte allowed himself, that and a slight painful hunching of the shoulders. Wiener bit her lip again and nodded at the girl.

Into the silence of Nolte’s room a single true note penetrated, followed swiftly by another and upon that still another. Wiener looked toward Nolte, who was standing so lifelessly still that it seemed he must topple over. She looked anxiously toward the girl. For ten minutes she went on, well into the second movement of her partita. Then Nolte wheeled round and strode down upon her. His eyes were blazing.

’Hören Sie auf!‘ he bellowed. ’Stop!’

The girl stopped and looked up at him, calm and unafraid.

‘Not that way!’ he shouted. ‘Never that way for Bach!’

He lifted his right hand and with grave deliberation placed the tip of the index finger against the tip of the thumb, all the time vibrating his hand and forearm.

‘It must be so,’ he barked, ‘distinct, well defined. It cannot be hazy. Bach, he is no romantic — no mist, no spray. He is clear water; he is a spring and a river and sometimes the sea. He is the daylight and the clear night, but no, never is he only dusk! Sehen Sie?‘

The girl nodded and paused a moment as if to think over and to absorb what he had said. Then she played again, and until she finished Nolte did not interrupt her, nor did he move away from her. His eyes were large and bright as they scanned her plain still face and her stubby skillful fingers. He had forgotten about Wiener, and all his ill humor had left him. When the music had ceased the girl tucked her violin under her arm again and, waiting for Nolte to speak, watched her bow swing back and forth as it hung from the crook of her right index finger. Nolte reached out one hand and placed it gently on her forearm.

‘Mein Kind,’ he began softly, ‘you know what I think, don’t you?’

The girl looked up into his face and her eyes were serious and intent, but there was no perplexity in them. She nodded her head knowingly. Nolte let his hand fall.

’Very well, you may go.’

The girl turned and walked toward the door, smiling a little at Wiener, who was weeping. As she placed her hand on the knob Nolte called after her.

‘What is your name, my friend?’

‘Hede Frey, sir,’ the girl answered quietly and went out.

‘Hede Frey,’ echoed Nolte softly, and looked kindly at Wiener.

He shook his head slowly and his eyes were full of pleading.

‘Not to-day, Wiener,’ he said, ‘the others — tell them I hear them tomorrow.’

Wiener nodded and dried her eyes.

‘ Ja, Maestro, as you say.’ She left him alone.

For several minutes Nolte stood looking at the spot where Hede had stood for her playing.

‘Hede Frey,’ he said to himself over and over, ‘Hede Frey and Pia Froschel. Those two, they shall be mine.’

Then he walked across the room and poured himself a drink of cognac, and as he lifted it to his lips there were bright tears standing in his eyes.

V

When Nolte’s year in Boston was up, he went to Chicago and took Hede with him. It never occurred to him that it could be otherwise, for he knew nothing of Hede save her genius. He did not even know where she came from. He did not know that at home Adam and Lise were denying themselves all but the most meagre necessities to keep Hede with him. He did not know that Lise, unknown to everyone, was drawing constantly upon a small inheritance left her by her sister, which she had once hoped to put by against Adam’s and her old age. He did not know that Adam had lied to his wife for the first time in their long married life, telling her that his wages had been cut and then sending the difference each week to Hede. He did not know that Lise was taking in six more washings every week than ever before, or that Adam was secretly cheating his union and working on piece work in the evenings. Nolte did not know all this, and, had he known, it is doubtful whether he would have cared. Hede was a genius, and for genius everything must be sacrificed.

It was the shrewd Wiener who finally pieced together the dreary facts and faced them. She found out nothing definite, since definite information must come from Hede and she was a silent creature who worked incessantly with never a word for anything but music. Her long acquaintance with Hede, instead of reassuring Wiener and establishing a true friendship between the girl and herself, seemed only to separate them, and Wiener was mystified. She was a friendly soul, Wiener was, and her simple, open nature was stung and hurt by the impregnable. And so only by much baffling observation and by her intuition and by her active Teutonic reasoning Wiener began to understand Hede’s mystery.

The conclusions which she reached frightened her, for, after all, was she not responsible for bringing Hede and Nolte together? Was it not she who had insisted that Nolte accept Hede’s fees when he, with his typical generosity, had suggested that he take her for nothing? For from the first Hede had somehow looked poor and Nolte must have sensed it. It was too late now, however, to broach that subject to Hede or to Nolte, because she felt that it would only bring disaster and recrimination upon herself. Wiener could live without Hede’s love or even her friendship, but her hatred would be too much to bear. Wiener knew, too, that any interference now on her part would make Hede hate her. So she let matters drift and hoped for the best.

Once, in one of those moments of indecision and fright, Wiener had spoken evasively to Nolte about Hede’s future. It was Nolte really who had started it by referring affectionately to Hede’s plainness.

‘Ja, Maestro,’ Wiener had agreed, and then shook her head a little, ‘but I am afraid for her when she stands on the concert stage.’

Nolte winked at her. ‘Ach, Wiener, but that will be her charm! Don’t you see?’

He leaned forward excitedly and the look in his eyes anticipated the event.

‘When she comes first out, everybody is disappointed. “The ugly duckling,” they will say. And then she begins to play — ach, Wiener, don’t you see?’

Wiener nodded. ‘Ja, all that I see — in Europe. But here in America, that is something else again, nicht wahr?’

Nolte’s eyes flashed, ‘Well, that is easy. Then she comes first out in Europe!’

‘But, Maestro — ’ Wiener did not finish. She did not quite dare to go on.

‘But what?’ bellowed Nolte, thoroughly aroused.

Wiener shrugged her shoulders and rose.

‘Ach, it makes no matter,’ she answered, and left the room hastily.

If only she were sure that Hede was conscious of all the complications of a début. Did the child know how expensive it would be? Did she know how much depended on luck and opportunity? One thing was certain: Nolte would never enlighten her, for he abhorred the practical. And yet, all these same considerations were what had kept him from the concert stage. But his subsequent renown and selfrealization as a teacher had obscured all that within himself. Then, too, never before had Nolte taught anyone without ample financial backing. If pupils were poor themselves, at least they had patrons.

‘Alas,’ thought Wiener, ‘for us all! And only I — I who mat ter the least — am prepared.’

VI

And then, one morning in the late spring of that second year with Nolte, what Wiener had feared and awaited came to pass. Hede had a letter from her mother.

‘Hede, Liebchen,’ it began. ‘I am afraid now I must tell you what I do not want to. Your father and I, we can’t help any more right now. But don’t be sad, Herzchen, you are young. Some day it all comes out all right. I can’t say any more. Come home, Hede. We will be good to you.’ . . .

That was all. But Hede did not show it to Nolte or to Wiener. She simply told them that they needed her at home for a little while and asked Nolte for a letter of recommendation. She might do a little teaching, she told him.

Nolte was beside himself. ‘ Aber, Kind, you can’t mean it! Now, now is the important time — now we are trimming and polishing. Six months and you are ready. Think only! Six months just.’

Hede shook her head and smiled one of her rare smiles.

‘No, Herr Nolte,’ — Hede had never been able to call him Maestro, — ‘it’s useless to talk. I have to go, but I’ll come back.’

Nolte tore at his hair and paced the floor.

‘Come back? Ja, when? You will come back! And then we got to start in all over again.’

Hede lowered her eyes. ‘No, we won’t. I can work alone a few months. That won’t do me so much harm — now, will it?’ She turned her strange untelling eyes upon Nolte.

Nolte reddened and raised his voice to a shriek. ‘ Gott im Himmel, Hede, what on earth has come over you now? You work — without me!‘

He turned to Wiener for assistance. Wiener was too frightened to speak.

‘But for why,’ he wheeled around and screamed at Hede, ‘for why must you go back?’

There was a long silence, and Wiener shuddered to think what was coming.

‘Because,’ Hede began in her deep, even voice, ‘because they’re stripped, my mother and father. They’ve sold their shirt to keep me — here.’

Nolte closed his eyes and the color slowly left his face. Wiener was twisting her handkerchief and looking fixedly at the floor.

Hede softened a little. ‘It’s no use talking, Herr Nolte. I’ve got to go. They need me for a while.’

The hot tears rose to Wiener’s eyes at that and she felt helpless and humiliated. Nolte opened his eyes.

‘And how long do you stay away, Hede?’ he asked her kindly.

‘Not long, I hope,’ she answered.

‘And if I find for you a patron, then what?’ asked Nolte.

Hede shook her head. ‘It’s not that, Herr Nolte, that I want. Not for me, anyhow — for them, maybe, yes.’ She laughed a little, a chunky, uneven laugh.

Nolte looked at her emptily and shook his head slowly.

‘No, you never come back to me. I see it all now.’

‘Oh, but you’re wrong, Herr Nolte, honestly you are!’ Hede folded her arms behind her back and began to draw imaginary figures on the rug with one toe. ‘You see, if it were to be any other way, I’d be missing something — for myself.’

Her toe was still and she looked full at Nolte. Suddenly her eyes burned and shone with courage and truth and innocence.

‘ And I never want to miss anything, Herr Nolte.’ Her deep voice was full of strong, sad music. ‘I always want all that’s coming to me. And I ’ll be better for it, too. I know it,’ — unexpectedly she walked up to Nolte and laid a hand on his arm, — ‘and so do you, Herr Nolte.’

Nolte winced and was silent for a moment. Wiener pressed her knotted handkerchief between her lips.

‘All right, Hede,’ said Nolte sadly. ‘When do you go?”

Hede patted his arm. ‘Why, pretty soon, I guess. The end of the week, maybe.’

Nolte took her hand. ‘To-morrow you come back, Hede,’ he said. I have the letter.’

Hede pressed his hand and released it. ‘Thank you, Herr Nolte.’

She moved toward the door.

‘Good-bye, Fräulein.’

Wiener made a gesture with her free hand. She could not trust herself to speak.

When the door had closed behind Hede, Nolte walked slowly across the room and stood at one of its windows looking out into the bright spring day. Wiener watched him, and it seemed to her that his shoulders sagged and he was looking older, almost old. She dried her eyes then and walked over to him. Together they looked into the brightness, but neither saw anything.

‘Wiener,’ said Nolte at last and passed an arm across her shoulders, ‘we go back now, back home. It is time.’

VII

It took Hede eighteen hours on the train to come back to Naples from Chicago. All the way she sat quietly in a day coach, forgetful of time or of movement. Now and then she looked out of the window, but the swiftchanging scene beyond it, the darting trees and telegraph poles, the swooping wires and the bulging hills — all these Hede stared at as if they were nothing, as if they were not there. More often she let her eyes fall upon a letter that lay open in her lap. It read: —

To Whom It May Concern:
I have been a teacher of the violin for nearly half a century. In that time it has been my pleasure and high privilege to help to develop a few geniuses. Two of those geniuses were women. Pia Froschel is one of them, Hede Frey the other. Neither, in my esteem, has ever surpassed the other.
Respectfully yours,
ANDREAS NOLTE

Hede could not believe it: he had made her equal with Pia Froschel! She thought back over her two years with Nolte and she could not believe it. After all, had he not held up before her always the greatness of Froschel as something to strive after, yet with scant hope of an equal attainment? Nolte felt sorry for her, he knew what was ahead of her, — the unsavory struggle with circumstances, the loneliness and despair, — and he wanted to alleviate it. Yet Nolte was not unkind, never cruel, and had he not meant every word of it, that would have been cruelty in the extreme.

What did it all mean? And would she ever come back? Hede saw now how effortless, how easy until this moment her life had been. Until now she had only wanted hard and worked, and in due time always the occasion had come and she had been ready. She saw now that hitherto, no matter how arduous and slow, her life had been a progress forward — toward ends and aspirations. What immediate beauty she had been enabled to put into her playing had been a kind of spiritual inheritance combined with a vicarious fulfillment of the living that surrounded her. Never had she been impelled by necessity to live; the morrow had taken care of itself, or, more truthfully, been taken care of.

That led her to the thought of Adam and Lise, to their believing, and to their struggle for her consummation as an artist. Her heart swelled within her and tears of anguish burned behind her eyes. In their generosity she discerned the paradox of love. In sparing her they had robbed her, all unknowingly and with the noblest intentions, of the artist’s ultimate achievement — to acquire at first hand the language of life, to construe and to articulate that complex medium. Suddenly Hede saw herself and her art as an implement, perfected in pattern and execution, shining and idle. Why, why had they done it?

But remembering them, whom for so long now she had not seen, she could not find it within the innocence and justice of her heart to condemn. For had their instinct not been rooted in love, a love that was utterly selfless? And, without proof tried and tested, Hede knew that in the end love can accomplish no wrong thing. It might forestall and postpone, but in the end its purpose must be fulfilled. And so, in this her first true knowing, Hede found comfort to face the dreary days before her — their extension and perplexities.

And when the long journey was ended and she saw from her window the figures of Adam and Lise scanning the faces in the slowing train, she was touched with a newness of wisdom and courage and a deep joy in sharing a high charge. She stepped forth to meet them, and as they saw her the anxious eyes of Adam and Lise began to shine, and within they felt a sudden peace and security.

(To be concluded)