La Lettre D'Amour

When Bardini, who led the Hungarian Band at the Savoy Restaurant, was promoted to play at the Casino at Trouville, his place was taken by the second violin. The second violin was a boy, and when he greeted his brother Tziganes and the habitues of the restaurant with an apologetic and deprecatory bow, he showed that he was fully conscious of the inadequacy of his years. The maitre d'hotel glided from table to table, busying himself in explanations.

"The boy's name is Edouard; he comes from Budapest," he said. "The season is too late to make it worth the while of the management to engage a new chef d'orchestre. So this boy will play. He plays very good, but he is not like Bardini."

He was not in the least like Bardini. In appearance, Bardini suggested a Roumanian gypsy or a Portuguese sailor; his skin was deeply tanned, his hair was plastered on his low forehead in thick, oily curls, and his body, through much rich living on the scraps that fell from the tables of Girot's and the Casino des Fleurs, was stout and gross. He was the typical leader of an orchestra condemned to entertain a noisy restaurant. His school of music was the school of Maxim's. To his skill with the violin he had added the arts of the head waiter, and he and the cook ran a race for popularity, he pampering to one taste, and the cook, with his sauces, pampering to another. When so commanded, his pride as an artist did not prevent him from breaking off in the middle of Schubert's Serenade to play Daisy Bell, nor was he above breaking it off on his own accord to salute the American patron, as he entered with the Belle of New York, or any one of the Gaiety Girls, hurrying in late for supper, with the Soldiers in the Park. When he walked slowly through the restaurant, pausing at each table, his eyes, even while they ogled the women to whom he played, followed the brother Tzigane--who was passing the plate--and noted which of the patrons gave silver and which gave gold.

Edouard, the second violin, was all that Bardini was not, consequently he was entirely unsuited to lead an orchestra in a restaurant. Indeed, so little did he understand of what was required of him that on the only occasion when Bardini sent him to pass the plate he was so unsophisticated as not to hide the sixpences and shillings under the napkin, and so leave only the half-crowns and gold pieces exposed. And, instead of smiling mockingly at those who gave the sixpences, and waiting for them to give more, he even looked grateful, and at the same time deeply ashamed. He differed from Bardini also in that he was very thin and tall, with the serious, smooth-shaven face of a priest. Except for his fantastic costume, there was nothing about him to recall the poses of the musician: his hair was neither long nor curly; it lay straight across his forehead and flat on either side, and when he played, his eyes neither sought out the admiring auditor nor invited his