"Stem and branch! I loved my little sister Anna, too. But what did they

do to her behind those marble walls? Did you fiddle for her? What was

she when they let her go? My pretty little Anna! The fires of hell

for those damned green stones of yours, Stefani! She heard of them and

wanted to see them, and you promised."

"I? I never promised Anna! ... So that was it? Boris, I only saw her

there. I never knew what brought her. But the boy was in England then."

"The breed, the breed!" roared the squat man. "Ha, but you should have

seen! Those gay officers and their damned master--we left them with

their faces in the mud, Stefani; in the mud! And the women begged. Fine

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music! Those proud hearts, begging Boris Karlov for their lives--their

faces in the mud! You, born of us in those Astrakhan Hills, you denied

us because you liked your fiddle and a full belly, and to play keeper

of those emeralds. The winding paths of torture and misery and death

by which they came into the possession of that house! And always the

proletariat has had to pay in blood and daughters. You, of the people,

to betray us!"

"I did not betray you. I only tried to save those who had been kind to

me."

A cunning light shot into Karlov's eyes. "The emeralds!" He struck his

pocket. "Here, Stefani; and they shall be broken up to buy bread for our

people."

"That poor boy! So he brought them! What are you going to do with me?"

"Watch you grow thin, Stefani. You want death; you shall want food

instead. Oh, a little; enough to keep you alive. You must learn what it

is to be hungry."

The squat man picked up the bundle from the table and tore off the

wrapping paper. A violin the colour of old Burgundy lay revealed.

"Boris!" The man in the chair writhed.

"Have I waked you, Stefani?"--tenderly. "The Stradivarius--the very

grand duke of fiddles! And he and his damned officers, how they used to

call out--'Get Stefani to fiddle for us!' And you fiddled, dragged your

genius though the mud to keep your belly warm!"

"To save a soul, Boris--the boy's. When I fiddled his uncle forgot

to drag him into an orgy. Ah, yes; I fiddled, fiddled because I had

promised his mother!"

"The Italian singer! She was lucky to die when she did. She did not see

the torch, the bayonet, and the mud. But the boy did--with his English

accent! How he escaped I don't know; but he died to-night, and the

emeralds are in my pocket. See!" Karlov held the instrument close to

the other's face. "Look at it well, this grand duke of fiddles. Look,

fiddler, look!"




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