He traced out the chords and the harmonies with the same
fervor that he followed the course of a stream or climbed a
mountain-path. A great player was he, although the power of creation
was not in him, for he fingered his viol with the ardor of a soul set
in its favorite way of all others. As David Hautville played his
great resonant viol he forgot all about his own perplexity and his
daughter's love-troubles; but she, listening as she worked, did not
forget.
Madelon, swept around with these sweet waves of sounds, never once
had her memory of her own misery submerged. A strange double
consciousness she had, as she listened, of her senses and her soul.
All her nerves lapsed involuntarily into delight at the sounds they
loved, and all her soul wept above all melodies and harmonies in her
ears. The spirit of an artist had Madelon, and could, had she wished,
have made the songs she sung; and for that very reason music could
never carry her away from her own self.
She finished her household tasks and sat down again to sew upon her
wedding-gown. After a while her father ceased playing, and leaned his
viol tenderly back in its corner, pulled on his great boots, put on
his leather jacket and his fur cap, lighted his pipe, shouldered his
gun, and set out with his eyes full of the abstraction of one who
follows alone a different path.
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