Page:The Blind Bow-Boy (IA blindbowboy00vanv).pdf/157

 this music was stirring her. She was drenched, nay submerged, in merciless floods of clang-tints: unnamable sins obsessed her consciousness. She exerted her will, and peeping between the folds of the curtain, gazed at the assemblage. The ladies' faces were drawn taut and pale; some of them were contorted by strange grimaces. Bosoms rose and fell in a shuddering, broken rhythm. The men looked hard and cold, like men who had just had their toes chopped off, but who were too stoical to scream. Suddenly, with one shrill blast from the saxophones, one crisp screech from the flutes, the band saw purple and cavorted into obsolete keys, neglecting its duties towards the tempered scale. Then, swiftly, with a tortured snatch of parody of I'll build a stairway to paradise, the overture ended. The men were now flushed and restless, seemingly ashamed to look at their companions. The ladies, as if to recover their poise, began to chatter affectedly. There was no applause.

A triumph! A complete triumph! Campaspe turned to the Duke.

Rather! he admitted. And I wanted this man to arrange some of Viganò's p-p-p-paltry tunes. He's better than Stravinsky!

Campaspe was reflective. He never wrote like this before. I wonder if it is Zimbule who has inspired him?

He has seen something. It is the last wail of a d-d-discarded mule in hell.