“The scowl,” declared my friend, “the scowl is merging into a smile of sadness. ‘Tis a hopeful sign. By and by your cure will be established. You have had a cancer, as it were. We have succeeded in scattering the virus through the system. Now we will proceed to its total eradication. I don’t know whether that is the course medical men in general pursue: but it sounds plausible, and I’m sure it’s the proper one for the present instance. Of course I don’t expect you ever to rejoice in that unalloyed buoyancy of spirits which distinguishes your servant: but you will become cheerful and contented; and the Italians say, ‘Whoso is contented is happy.’.rdquo; It seemed as if his predictions were being verified. Though at no time did I cease to think of Veronika, though at no time did I become insensible of the loss I had sustained, still the fact was that I commenced to take an interest in what went on around me, commenced in a certain sense to extract pleasure from my circumstances. “You have been a dreadful egotist,” said Merivale, “profoundly self-absorbed. It was inevitable that you should be for a while. But there is no excuse for you to be so any longer. A purely selfish sorrow is as much a self-indulgence as a purely selfish joy, and has as little dignity. It dwarfs, enervates, demoralizes the soul: a platitude which you would do well to memorize.” At first I had hesitated to try a second experiment with the violin: yet the very motive of my hesitancy—namely, the recollection of how my feelings had got the best of me the last time—acted also as a temptation. One day while Merivale was absent I tuned his Stradivari, and with much the sensation of a fledgling launched upon a perilous and uncertain flight, let my right arm have its way. The result was encouraging. I determined that henceforward I should practice regularly. The music brought me near to Veronika, and now I could endure this nearness without quailing. Though it was by no means destitute of pain, somehow the very pain was a luxury. Henceforth not a day passed without my dedicating several hours to the violin. Merivale, as he had put it, “scraped a little.” He had put it too modestly. He had already learned to read with remarkable facility; and instruction profited him to such a degree that he was soon able to sustain a very accurate second. So when we were at loss for another occupation we would while the hours away with Schubert’s songs. We spent most of our evenings in-doors, chatting at the fireside. Sometimes Merivale would take himself off to pay a visit in the town. Then I would invariably fall to marveling at the change he had wrought in my life. “It is certain,” I said, “that Destiny holds some happiness still in store for you.” I was mistaken. Destiny was simply granting me a momentary respite—drawing off, preparatory to delivering her final culminating blow.