THE CHINA MAIL FRIDAY SUPPLEMENT, APRIL 22, 1938
MUSIC MASTER
(Continued from Page 1)
the hair and eyes, and yet not to know, in absence, the expression.
** *
some-
The governess, as if afraid that Elsa was escaping little from school life because she was thinking about thing else, said: "Elsa, pass the tea to Mary on your right. Can't you see we are all waiting for you ?".
The wares of talk swept round her again. Mary, on her right, said: "Aren't you looking for- ward to your first lesson from Herr Muller?” And Elsa answer- ed. "But I don't take music.”
The family aunts had not thought it worth while to have any extras included in her educa- tion, and this made her sad. She thought in. her self-pitying, childish way,
"No one cares what happens to me." And look- ing ahead she wondered now if it would be any different when she grew up.
The other children made charts of the days and hours that must be lived through before the holidays. They reminded Elsa of the old men she had seen at Monte Carlo with their rou- lette systems. The children were all looking forward to being grown up because they would have some choice in their lives then, there would be alternatives.
Here at school everything was the same, everything arranged beforehand, but it seemed to El- sa as she thought of her mother's agitated hopelessness and her stepfather's existence of gilded squalor that the wills of grown- up people soon became damag-› ed or impaired so that in a little while they were no better off than schoolchildren.
she
Miss Sturgeon, the fiuttering, hen-like English mistress, did not look as if she was "captain of her fate," and Mademoiselle Dunant, as thinly embittered as if had been fed on vinegar off the end of a hatpin from childhood, did not appear the "master of her soul".
A week later the new music master amived.
He was as much of a disap- pointment as Sammy, the school dog, who, through being teased, had become snappy, and, although an unlovable animal, was too old. to send away.
The music master was fair, he wore spectacles, smiled a great deal without charm, wa5 over- polite, and had a Teutonic exact- ness which exasperated every one round hira.
Although he had a strong Ger* man accent, he had learned En- glish with such painstaking care that he was always correcting the schoolchildren, saying. “Ex- cuse me, please, but you cannot. say that. It is not English." He knew a great deal about music; he could talk about it for hours, but it did not make him interest- ing.
Herr Muller had a habit of washing his face many times a day. One of the schoolgirls, the daughter of a psycho-analyst, told the others that it was a sign that he had a guilty conscience, but afterwards she said: "I got it wrong about Herr Muller washing his face. It is only when people are always wash ing their hands that you can be sure of this sense of guilt in them."
She said she did not know if Herr Muller's washing his face. had any particular psychological
meaning; perhaps there was some
-
past memory he wanted to wash out of his mind.
Although the schoolchildren soon lost interest in this middle- aged, overclean German profes sor of music, Elsa could not ac- custom herself to him. The deep loathing and hatred with which his whole personality inspired her became like a cloud over her mind.
It was something which was al- ways there, which, like an insis- tent, unanswerable question, she could neither accept nor reject, and when
one of the younger children became seriously ill and died within a few days Elsa, in her fateful way, though it was because of the luck the Ger- man music master brought with hind.
The parents of the dead child arrived at the school in the after- noon.
The fluttering, hen-like Miss Sturgeon hurried away from the large classroom where she was taking preparation to receive them. In a little while Made- moiselle Dunant, a morbid smile disfiguring her face, entered the room of silent study and with her Herr Muller, who was to re- place Miss Sturgeon.
Being a child was, perhaps, i state of mind so mad from an adult point of view that it seem- ed to the French governess that the attitude of the children to- wards the death showed an al- ·
Be- most insane heartlessness. fore taking her reasoning, em- bittered presence from the room she said: "I regret very much to have to say this, but, children, I was shocked hearing you laugh- ing as you ran out to play in thê garden this afternoon. Children, how could you, with poor little Susan's dead body upstairs?"
The child had gone from this small community without im- the pressing her personality on others. She had been with them only a short while. As if un- able to hold an impression long in their minds, the life and the death of the child had already been forgotten.
They stared now at the gov- erness with stolid, expressionless faces as if each child had the power to assume at will a mask. and Mademoiselle Dunant, thin and crochety like a cardboard figure on stilts, departed through the door, leaving Herr Muller to take his place at the high desk, his face well washed and shin- ing like a boy's knee
** * *
Half an hour went by as Herr Muller silently studied a thick text-book on music theory. In a little while, at a quarter to seven, it would be time for them to leave. and prepare for supper. One of the girls, waiting for the supper bell, began to put her lesson books in a neat pile on the desk in front of her.
Herr Muller looked up. “It is not yet time, Fraulein, to prepare to leave."""
The schoolgirl made a prefence of setting her books out again ready for study, but in a little while two or th of the other children started to put their books away.
"Frauleins, it is not yet time to leave."
WA
"But. Herr Muller, always stop work at a quarter to seven, and it is already ten to seven"
Herr Muller looked up at the
America Strikes Oil
New Style
new kind of oil boom as a MERICA is experiencing a
result of Japan's military opera- tions in China. But the oil does not come from deep wells, sunk in the earth. It comes from trees!
The trees are known as tung trees. The oil from them is used in the paint, varnish, oil-cloth and
large schoolroom clock and then- back again into the centre of the room. It seemed to Elsa that reflected in Herr Müller's spec- tacles, she suddenly saw the im- age of her father. His rather strange, complex expression was brought back to her as clearly as if she had seen his face in a mirror.
With his irritating exactness. Herr Muller said: "The school- room clock is fast. This is the right time.”
He took out his own watch and held it up for the whole room to see. It was a heavy gold watch with Roman figures painted on the face in a thick, exaggerated >way.
Herr Muller said: "You may all get ready to go now." And at this moment he touched a hidden spring in the side of the watch, which set going a thin, ridiculous chime.
pa r-making industries: The Japanese invasion of China has so crippled the exportation of tang oil (most of the world's tung oil came from China) that the price has risen from 6d to 3s..
to a pound, and the industries which it is essential are feeling the pinch.
So, in Mississipi and Louisiana, vast groves-of tung trees are be- ing laid out America had al- ready introduced tung tree planta- tions to these states and to Florida as the basis of a new industry. That was six years ago, but it has taken the China war to sti- mulate the scheme.
tung
From 10,000 acres the plantings have been increased to 100,000, and plans are afoot to add yet another 35,000 to the total acreage.
Crushing plants have been erected to extract the oil, and large prices are being obtained for the tank-loads of oil which are being shipped from the tung- growing centres.
It is pointed out that these prices are above the nomal, but even at normal prices, growers claim, the returns are larger. The value of the land on which tung trees were originally grown has more than trebled.
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