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Although the burghers of Nijmegen resented the all-German audience (most of the tickets were sold in Germany and only 60 Nijmegeners got in, on tickets made available at the last moment), the recital was a tremendous success with the visitors. The critics agreed that Rubinstein's playing was almost metaphysical. "The sad thing for us," mused the Frankfurter Allgemeine, "is that German musical culture of the time of Beethoven, Brahms, Schumann and Liszt, which we have every reason to mourn for, is so immediately present in hardly any artist of the world but Artur Rubinstein."
There was even some speculation that now, at 74, Rubinstein may be growing a bit nostalgic for the old Germany that treated him so well during seven happy years as a Wunderkind. Perhaps he had played the recital to test the wind for his return to die Heimat.
But that was hollow talk. The line was still drawn. Rubinstein gave the proceeds of the evening to the International Red Cross—still engaged in salving wounds from the war. And as a little reminder that his old oath was not forgotten, he said: "We Jews are sentimental people. We are in tears when we come to a spot where we know our people have been killed. Can you imagine how my hundreds of relatives, all slaughtered by the Germans, would feel looking down from the sky at me—playing in Berlin?"