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The player lost herself in a wandering medley, echoes from "Boheme" and "Pagliacci"; then drifted into improvisation and played her heart into it magnificently a heart released to happiness. The still air of the room filled with wonderful, golden sound: a song like the song of a mother flying from earth to a child in the stars, a torrential tenderness, unpent and glorying in freedom.
Tell him, with my compliments, not to play such latter-day tunes as the gavotte from Pagliacci." "Oh, I'll tell him, you may be sure," said he, quite dryly. We saluted and dashed down the road to Amboise, where we hoped to capture our rare prize. We had ridden about a mile when a dog attempted to cross our path. We all but ran the poor brute down. "Why, it's lame!" exclaimed Arnold.
A high-bosomed young woman with a powerful mezzo soprano that pulled her mouth to a rhomboid sang Santuzza's famous aria from "Cavalleria Rusticana," stopping suddenly to some unseen signal. "Fine, strong voice of resonant tin," said Visigoth, under his breath. A throaty young tenor sang "Ride, Ride, Pagliacci," through to the sob, anticipating it with a violent throw of body.
The opera billed for that night was Pagliacci. A young American baritone with a phenomenal high A, was to sing "Tonio" and a new Spanish soprano was cast for "Nedda." When this young woman saw the Sunday papers she, too, went into a violent rage.
I remember vaguely the crowning episode of the evening when the little major was dancing the Irish jig with a kitchen chair; when Falstaff was singing the Prologue of Pagliacci to the stupefied colonel; when the boy, once of Barts', was roaring like a lion under the mess table, and when the tall, melancholy surgeon was at the top of the tent pole, scratching himself like a gorilla in his native haunts... Outside, the field hospital was quiet, under a fleecy sky with a crescent moon.
"Hark," said Michael, in a hoarse voice. "That's the gavotte from Pagliacci. Listen! Don't you remember it?" "Pshaw!" I said roughly, for my nerves were all astir. "It's the Alceste music of Gluck." "Look, look, gentlemen!" called our host, and as the moon glowed again in the blue we saw at the edge of the forest a white figure, saw it, I swear, although it vanished at once and the music ceased.
I am a great liar. And we both cried a little, although, even then, he kept telling me how bad crying was for the voice, and we did some Pagliacci together, just as if nothing had happened." "It must have been a wonderful life," Francis said, a great appreciation in his voice. "It was; I miss it here some, although people are so kind. And you?" she demanded. "Tell me about yourself."
Now it was "Pagliacci" that wonderful passage where the injured husband pours out his soul in agony. Stafford closed the doors of the little room where he and Byng had sat, and stood an instant listening to the music. He shuddered as the passionate notes swept over his senses. In this music was the note of the character of the man who played sensuous emotion, sensual delight.
The Pagliacci are a troupe of itinerant mountebanks, the characters being Nedda, the Columbine, who is wife of Canio, or Punchinello, master of the troupe; Tonio, the Clown; Beppe, the Harlequin; and Silvio, a villager. The first act opens with the picturesque arrival of the troupe in the village, and the preparations for a performance in the rustic theatre, with which the peasants are overjoyed.
"'A fine opera is "I Pagliacci." Now listen for the answer." A moment elapsed, then, "Not without Gennaro," came a gruff voice in Italian from the dictograph. A silence ensued. It was tense. "Wait, wait," said a voice which I recognised instantly as Gennaro's. "I cannot read this. What is this, 23 Prince Street?" "No. 33. She has been left in the backyard," answered the voice.
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