V.

I have already had an opportunity of telling you that I had been

brought up chiefly on detective stories. I therefore thought that there

would be but little difficulty in solving the case of Miss Doblana.

In a nutshell this case was as follows: She was sure that nobody had

called, while her father seemed certain to the contrary. How did he

know it? He did not say. The mysterious visitor had left no card,

otherwise either Mitzi or Fanny would have found it when they arrived,

which was some time before Mr. Doblana's return. Besides, a card

generally bears a name, and the horn-player's question to his daughter

had been: "Who called upon you during my absence?" which proved that he

only knew, or thought he knew, that somebody had called, but did not

know who the somebody was.

We rang for Fanny. Had Mr. Doblana asked her anything in connexion

with the affair?

"Yes," she said, "on the Monday morning he asked me who had called

during his absence, and I said: 'Nobody.'"

Thereupon Miss Doblana wanted to know, why Fanny had not said the

truth, namely, that she did not know.

"He was very cross," answered the girl, "and I thought that perhaps

somebody did call, and that _Fräulein_ did not wish Mr. Doblana to

know."

"You have a good opinion of me, Fanny. However, what did he do when you

said that nobody had called?"

"He did not do anything. He swore. He said that I was in the plot, and

that we were both deceiving him."

"In the circumstances you could have told him that you were absent all

the time."

"And what would have been the good of it? He would have thought that

_Fräulein_ had removed me intentionally."

I recognized that Fanny had quite a lot of common sense. So did

Mitzi, for an extraordinary thing took place: She asked Fanny for

advice.--Think of a young English lady asking for the advice of a

general, or even of a between-maid.

Fanny declared that above all _Fräulein_ must recover her freedom.

"But how?" cried Mitzi and I _unisono_.

Fanny looked at us and seemed to pity us for the evident helplessness

of our brains.

"The young gentleman" (that was I), "will go in an hour's time to the

opera. The rehearsal will be over, he will by chance meet Mr. Doblana

leaving the theatre, and they will walk home together. In the meantime

_Fräulein_ will have dressed and will go out, and she will, by chance,

too, meet the two gentlemen in the street."

"But," interfered Mitzi, "he will make a fearful row!"

"In the street?" said Fanny. "No fear. An Imperial and Royal Member of

the Court Chapel will make no row in the street. He will present you to

each other, and the young gentleman" (that was, of course, again I),

"will enquire into _Fräulein's_ health, and _Fräulein_ will answer that

she is now quite well, and she will never more be locked up."

What a shame that such brains are wasted on servant girls! And the

Editor of the _Evening News_ when he reads this page will say: What

luck that a certain Government did not know that Fanny! A special

department would have been created for her: she would be appointed

President of the Board of Intelligence.

Up to this day I wonder how she knew all about Mitzi's journey to

Salzburg and about the Giulay wire. Her young mistress when talking to

her had given her no details, yet she knew. She knew and even thought

it desirable that _Fräulein_ should communicate with Mr. Giulay, call

upon him and ask him about that telegram.

"I know," she added, "that it is a month since he last left Vienna,

even for half-a-day."

"How did you learn this?" asked Mitzi.

"But," said Fanny with just a flavour of contempt, "I wanted to know.

So I made friends with his mother's cook."

I was overwhelmed. Fanny was revealing herself as a really superior

being. You may therefore believe me that it was almost with reverence

that I received her instructions.

"The young gentleman," she said, "will do well in getting on familiar

terms with Mr. Doblana, for we must know what prevents him from being

more explicit. If the young gentleman could win his confidence, we

might learn what happened in that hour between his return home and

his declaration to _Fräulein_ that somebody must have visited her.

Something must have led him to that wrong conclusion. And the young

gentleman could find out not only what it was, but also why Mr. Doblana

is so vague."

"And how am I to win his confidence?"

Fanny scratched herself. For the first time she appeared a little

perplexed. But the scratching soon helped.

"I know a way," she declared, "but it will be terrible. The young

gentleman must learn to play the horn."

Statesmen are merciless.

Now, if you are a reader of the _Evening News_ you know that Statesmen

have often ideas of a dazzling appearance, but which, all things

considered, prove rather unsubstantial. They work all right, yet the

results are slight. They seem very clever ideas, but somehow they

do not reach the main point of the question. I am sorry to state

that Fanny in this respect as in other ways was worthy of her fellow

statesmen and that, brilliant as was the appearance of her bits of

advice, and workable as they were, they led to no definite result.

And so the reader need not fear that the solution of the case of Miss

Doblana will be reached before the last chapters.

Yet, the outer reconciliation between the horny father and his

daughter took place that same day in exactly the same form as Fanny

had foreseen it, and Mitzi recovered her liberty. Henceforth she had

again the freedom of her movements, and I the pleasure of seeing

her unconstrainedly. But that did not bring her one step nearer to

the knowledge of what her father was reproaching her with. His was

an obstinate silence. She asked him why he suspected her of having

received any visitor during his absence, and he answered sternly:

"You know, and you had better tell me who it was."

And that was all.

The next day she went to see Giulay; but she came home greatly

disappointed. He swore on his oath that he had not sent the Salzburg

telegram, that he had not left Vienna, and that there had been no

splendid opportunity whatever which could have induced him to send that

wire.

"Either Giulay lies," explained I to Mitzi, when she had finished

telling me this story, "or this wire is the keystone of the whole

mystery."

"I am sure," was her answer, "that Giulay not only speaks the truth,

but also that he is incapable of telling any lies."

Holy Moses! An agent, especially a theatrical one, was here considered

trustworthy. Well, perhaps my doubt was unjust--perhaps we had only

arrived at that chapter which is commonly entitled: "The Mystery

thickens," and without which no detective story would sell.

"If Giulay speaks the truth," I went on, "then it is obvious that

somebody else sent that wire, somebody who was well acquainted with the

fact that this particular wire would make you undertake the journey

to Salzburg. Who can this person be? What can his aim have been? Why

especially to Salzburg?"

"Do you mean to say that it was my cousin Augusta who sent it?"

"The suggestion is yours."

"It is impossible. Firstly, had she had something particular to tell

me, I would have come quite as well if she had called me signing the

wire by her own name instead of by Giulay's. And secondly, even in case

of her fearing that my father would have objected to my journey to her,

and if she had wanted to hide from him the reason of my travelling to

Salzburg, she would have been at the station to meet me on my arrival,

instead of letting me wait there for a couple of hours, and would have

informed me of the truth. But she was genuinely surprised when she saw

me, and, pleased as she was to pass a few hours with me, there was not

the slightest reason why she should have called me to Salzburg."

I did not dare to tell her that to judge from Mr. Doblana's behaviour

something serious must have happened, and that in my opinion Augusta

von Heidenbrunn was not free from suspicion. People sometimes think

very badly of their friends, yet they do not allow others to express

these thoughts. So I kept silent on the point.

Sagacious Fanny was again consulted.

"_Fräulein_ ought to write to the _Herr_ Lieutenant" (that was Franz

von Heidenbrunn's rank). "Men can do more than women in such cases. And

ask him to find out who sent that wire. Then we shall know all."

Once more the advice seemed good, and Mitzi followed it. The

Lieutenant's answer came by return; he would try, and he felt pretty

sure that he would succeed. After a week or so, however, there came

another letter saying that he had failed. He had found the telegraph

office from which the telegram had been dispatched, but the name of the

sender was unknown, and the official to whom it had been handed was

unable even to remember whether the sender had been a man or a woman.

So we were no wiser than before.

In the meantime I had followed Fanny's third suggestion, namely, to

make friends with my host by taking lessons.

M'yes!

What the people who lived underneath and above us must have thought of

my first trials on the horn I do not know, nor have I any wish to know

it. I dare say my trials were a trial to them.

There is a little tune which every Englishman knows, for it serves to

call dogs with, when they are on tour in the streets. That tune is the

theme which young Siegfried carols rejoicing in the forest; at least,

he is supposed to do it; in reality it is the first horn-player placed

in the wings of the theatre. The horn there illustrates rapturous vital

power. You ought to have heard me and my vital power--or no! no! You

are a kind person, you have bought this book, or at least, you have

borrowed it from your Circulating Library, anyhow, you are reading it;

you are a friend, and there is no reason for my wishing you evil, not

even retrospectively. Nobody can in the least imagine what I achieved

on the horn. At first I could not utter a sound at all, but then, when

I succeeded!... How the dogs of Belsize Park would have been jealous

had they heard my barking. And I carolled, not as if I had been young

Siegfried, but a young dragon, nay! an old one!

That second-hand genius of modern German music (second-hand down to his

very name, for the first owner of it was the great Johann Strauss),

well, Richard Strauss once said that if he had been Bizet (which,

Heaven be thanked he was not), one would have heard in the last act

of _Carmen_ the bellowing of the bull counterpointed against the

celebrated duo between Carmen and Don José. I do not know whether he

ever wrote that part for the bull--but with my real talent I was able

after three lessons to play it. I am sorry that Richard did not hear

me, it was delightfully terrible.

* * * * *

There are strange coincidences. As I sit there, sucking my pencil (my

Turkish fountain pen having disappeared) and remembering my first

attempts at playing the horn and, later, at writing for it, something

strikes my ear. A father (at least a decent one) always recognizes his

children, and if I was no great composer, I may at least say that I was

a decent one. What I hear is music, played by a military band. And what

do they play? What, if it is not my own paraphrase on the "Pibroch o'

Donuil Dhu"? Yes, there is a military band somewhere in the rear, and

what the horns attack is the theme of "Pibroch o' Donuil Dhu" set as

Doblana had told me to do it.

You ask me, ignorant reader, what that "Pibroch o' Donuil Dhu" is. The

oldest military march ever composed in these foggy islands of Great

Britain, at a time when--at a time--well, earlier than that. It is a

Scotch tune, fierce and proud, the right thing to be thought of in our

fierce and proud time. I scored an arrangement of it as an entr'acte

when I was writing my opera _Lady Macbeth_. But I must not anticipate.

How I came to write _Lady Macbeth_ (not _Macbeth_, as you will notice,

but _Lady Macbeth_) that I will tell in due time.

For the present I listen and remember. That Scotch march, that weird

melody, calls back to my memory all the days of Vienna, all the story

which I am busy writing.

And while they play, I hum the words Sir Walter Scott wrote of the old

tune:

Pibroch o' Donuil Dhu,

Pibroch o' Donuil,

Wake thy wild voice anew,

Summon clan Conuil.

Come away, come away,

Hark to the summons,

Come in your war array.

Gentles and commons!

Come from deep glen and from mountain so rocky,

Warpipe and pennon are at Inverlochy.

Come ev'ry hill-plaid and true heart that wears one,

Come ev'ry steel blade and strong hand that bears one.

Leave untended the herd

And the flock without shelter,

The corpse uninterr'd

And the bride at the altar.

Leave the deer, leave the steer.

Leave nets and barges,

Come in your fighting gear,

Broad swords and targes.

Come as the winds come, when forests are rended,

Come as the waves come, when navies are stranded.

Faster come, faster come, faster and faster,

Chief, vassal, page and groom, tenant and master!

Fast they come, fast they come,

See how they gather,

Wide wave the eagle plumes

Blended with heather.

Cast your plaids, draw your blades,

Forward each man set,

Pibroch o' Donuil Dhu,

Knell for the onset!

I wonder. How does it happen that they are playing my march here? I do

not even remember whether I left the score in Vienna or took it with me.

Now they play other music, the overture of _Poet and Peasant_, of

course, and the waltz from the _Merry Widow_ and other things--all

Viennese, my God!--as if to make it still harder to me, to think that

these days of Vienna, these beautiful days of mirth and sorrow, should

be gone for ever, for ever!--And then, then they play the "Pibroch

o' Donuil Dhu" once more, and then nothing else. Nothing. I dream, I

wonder, and an hour passes.

* * * * *

"Post!"

This cry would awaken a dormouse. There are but three things at the

front. Long stretches of boredom, short ones of fright, and post.

Two of the letters are for me, and the first one is from Dad. Just now

I had been wondering at that strange performance of the "Pibroch o'

Donuil Dhu." Here is the solution of the riddle.

"My lad,

"I quite understand that composing is an impossibility when one is

in the firing line, and I regret having worried you. I therefore do

not send you the music paper. But I have forwarded a few days ago

the parts of your Scottish march to your regimental bandmaster. You

see, I want one of your marches to be played when you are going on

towards victory. And as you can't compose another one, it may as well

be the "Pibroch." Before I sent the parts I had the music played to

me. It was only a band of the Salvation Army, I could not get hold

of anything else. We went there to hear it, your mother and I and

Bean, who was just staying in London. My word, it was beautiful, and

it reminded me of the olden days. If only I could once more hear

the whole opera. Mother looked very proud and dignified, Bean wept,

but wept like a fountain, and I ... well, I had it performed three

times. I gave the bandmaster a cheque for ten guineas. At first he did

not want to accept it; he said it had been a pleasure to play such

beautiful music, and apologized for the two little mistakes that had

been made..."

(Happy man! He had heard only two!)

"... And then he pocketed the cheque all the same. Mother sends you

hearty kisses. So do I.

"DANIEL COOPER."

Dad! Good Dad! There isn't a Dad like you in all the world.

The other letter is from Bean. It is quite short.

"Dear Pat" (it runs), "I have just heard your beautiful music. I am

quite overcome. With such sounds striking our soldiers' ears, how

can they march to anything else than Victory? I feel that I must do

something, too. My heart drives me forth.

"The girl you left behind you,

"BEAN."

And Bean, there isn't a Bean like you in all the world, either.

* * * * *

I have lost a whole day, remembering and musing. This would have been

rather bad if this book were written to an order from a publisher.

For one reason or another publishers are always in a hurry. But then

they belong to the higher orders of animals. A simple _Tommyius

subterraneus_ has plenty of time.

Yet perhaps you have not. Therefore I hasten to return to the nice

sounds I used to extract out of an unhappy horn. It is intentionally

that I used the word "extract," which will remind you of a toothache.

So did my blowing the horn. It was pitiful, yet heroic. For, in truth,

I had no wish to make a living out of these horny studies. It was all

for the sake of the charming Mitzi. Had I but been in possession of her

fleshy lips!

I notice that this last sentence has a double sense. On the one hand it

means that I have thin lips and therefore enjoyed great difficulties in

producing any sounds on the horn. But on the other hand that sentence

also informs you of my ardent desire to call Mitzi' s red lips my own.

I had fallen in love with her from the first day, from the very moment

when in the railway carriage I had been attracted by the handsome

contours of ... of ... of the reverse of the medal. I had now arrived

at that state when the very name Mitzi would strike my brain with a

glowing emotion, when I liked to forget all other things and to occupy

myself solely with her, remembering the evenness of the outline of

her figure, her feminine daintiness, her slim, narrow feet. Yet, I had

no experience of women, my feelings were intense, but my thoughts were

vague, my love was a formless abstraction, and Mitzi a perceptible

fact. In truth, I did not know that I was in love, and some time had to

pass before I realized it.

In the meantime I used my breath in blowing the horn. Nevertheless

I did not gain Mr. Doblana's confidence. His intercourse with his

daughter seemed to be restricted to the utmost necessary, and I was

unable to find out with what offence he was reproaching her. Still,

if I did not learn his secret--for it was evidently a secret--I had

occasion to study his character.

After about a dozen lessons he allowed that I was hopeless as a

horn-player. He strongly advised me to give it up. But having once

tasted my money (or, to render unto Cæsar the things that were Cæsar's,

the money of Daniel Cooper & Co., Ltd., Insurance Brokers, London,

E.C.), and having found it savoury and palatable, he decided on having

another helping of it.

"Mr. Cooper," he said--he always pronounced my name with a hyphen

between the two o's, associating it probably by some mysterious

etymology with the origin of Cooperative societies--"Mr. Cooper, you

have talent only as a composer; but I am afraid that you will profit

very little by the lessons you take with Hammer. He is a genius and,

poor devil, I do not grudge him the little money you will let him earn;

however, I venture to say that you would benefit more by studying with

a more practical man like me. Of course, it could not be the same

figure..."

Now, as he did not know what I was paying Hammer, these last words

could only refer to his own lessons, the famous attempts at teaching

me the horn, and this was already twice the cost of Hammer's lessons.

But it was true that I improved little with the organist's loose

and obscure explanations which, indeed, were more fascinating than

serviceable; and I was only too glad to be relieved from the torture

I inflicted upon myself and the neighbourhood. Besides, had I not the

duty, as it were, of cultivating my friendship with Mr. Doblana?

So I accepted, and had Viennese lessons in the noble art of

composition, from a Czech, at London terms. Nor had I to regret my

decision, for Mr. Doblana proved a most invaluable teacher. I have

already stated that I owe to him all I know, little as it may be.

I was not only his pupil, but his apprentice, which is the best, the

surest way of learning, for it necessitates a continuous connexion

between the master and the disciple.

Mr. Doblana was now composing a new ballet called _Aladdin_, and many

pages of this work were scored out by me from his sketches.

Now, if the reader will be good enough to peruse again the fourth

chapter of this book, he will find that Mitzi had informed me that her

father was working on a ballet called _Griseldis_, the book of words of

which--if I may use the euphemism "book of words"--had been provided by

the Archduke Alphons Hector, or the _Herr Graf_, whichever name you may

prefer for this exalted person. The book of _Aladdin_, too, was signed

Joseph Dorff, the Archduke's nom de plume.

As I was training myself not only as a composer but also as a

detective, I thought that this inconsistency might have its importance,

and I submitted it to the joint council of Mitzi and Fanny. Mitzi only

abandoned herself to grief. In former days she would have known all

about it, while now her father treated her with such indifference!

But Fanny declared the incident of no importance: The first ballet

"Fa_ther_ Morgana" had also had another name at the beginning.

"Yes," said Mitzi, "it was at first called _Daphnis and Chloe_."

"How is that possible?" asked I. "The two subjects seem absolutely

different--as different as _Griseldis_ and _Aladdin_."

"Oh!" declared Mitzi lightly, "that does not matter with ballet. The

same music can always serve for the most dissimilar objects. When

father altered _Daphnis and Chloe_ into _Fata Morgana_ he said he

had only to add some fifths to the bass, and some strange drums and

tambourins in order to change his music from occidental to oriental."

This seemed to me very deep and probably true. So the incident was

dismissed. Yet I had never been nearer a clue! I ought at least to

have noticed that Mr. Doblana was not merely adapting a musical dress

from its occidental fashion to an oriental one, but that, musically

speaking, he was making up his _balletis personæ_ in real old carpets

from Baghdad or some other such place.

* * * * *

One evening--he and I used to pass his free evenings together--we

went to a tavern called the "Tobacco Pipe," one of those places which

a London innkeeper would not fail to denominate "Ye olde...." The

whole of the Round Table used to meet there once a month in a nice

smoky back-room. It was a large room, which from its dimensions seemed

lower than it really was. It was panelled in old dark oak, and on

the ceiling heavy black joists were visible. The tables, which no

table-cloth adorned, were made of old oak, as were the chairs and the

rest of the furniture. Old fashioned oil lamps fixed on the joists

succeeded in giving the whole locality a kind of pleasant homeliness,

although these oil lamps were lit by electricity. I was told that this

room was several hundred years old, and that the new modern house

had been built around it. That room was in great demand by all sorts

of societies, and it was not possible for it to be hired by one body

oftener than for one evening a month, because decisions in any trade or

profession had to be taken at "The Tobacco Pipe" if fashion was to be

satisfied.

That day the programme of the Round Table was to find some means of

defence against the growing invasion of amateurs in the theatrical and

especially the musical profession. All the people I knew were there

and, of course, many more.

Poor Hammer, who was the senior of the company, made the first speech.

He began all right, talking of art for art's sake, but soon lost the

subject and, before anybody knew how it had happened, was explaining

the fundamental difference between mediæval and modern counterpoint.

By unanimous consent he was deprived of the power of going on with his

speech, and, greatly astonished, sat down.

The _Herr Graf_ said, that being himself a sort of an amateur he was

defending their cause. He quite understood that hopeless cases should

be prevented from producing their work in public, but such rule could

not be applied to all. Had not Wagner been called an amateur? The only

way out was the creation of a special tribunal for such disputes.

An elderly gentleman who stammered told the assembly that if Wagner

had been suppressed it would not have been a shame. He was hissed into

silence, and Mr. Bischoff declared that such words were Anti-German,

that to attack Wagnerism was to attack Germanism, that Wagner's object

had been the freeing of opera from its traditional and conventional

Franco-Italian forms, and his one law: dramatic fitness.

Thereupon another speaker arose. He was a medical man by profession,

and his name was Doctor Bernheim. He declared that the subject of

Germanism was quite out of place, and that the right way of tackling

the question had been indicated by Mr. Hammer.

Immediately the old man got up, bowed in an awkward way and offered

his snuff box to the Doctor, who went on: Certainly, there were two

different classes of artists. There was art for art's sake, music

which had only that one aim of being beautiful, and in this he included

art for technique's sake. The other class was art for the expression

of an idea, in his opinion the higher form of art, though he admitted

that his opinion mattered very little. Only these two classes of

artists counted at all, and it was the public's, not the artist's,

duty to decide who could be ranged in the one or the other category,

and who was not to be counted in either of them. The struggle against

amateurs had to be fought not by the institution of a tribunal, but by

the production of work either so skilled or so highly inspired that no

amateur could compete.

Doctor Bernheim seemed to have won the day when Mr. Doblana chose

to take part in the discussion. In his opinion the Doctor had made

a mistake by including art for technique's sake into art for art's

sake. Technique could be taught, and learning alone had nothing common

with art. He, Doblana, knew composers for the brain and composers

for the heart; only the latter were artists by the grace of God, the

only ones he admitted. The public could not decide who deserved

this qualification. But the one fact, that a composer was capable of

inventing new melodies, real melodies, would entitle him to being

called an artist.

I did not like Doblana's view of the question, yet I would have given

anything to spare him the answer.

It was Giulay, of all people, Maurus Giulay, who stood up and attacked

the horn-player.

"Everybody," he said, "knows that Mr. Doblana is a good business man.

In fact, there is no other musician of such money grubbing habits in

the whole town of Vienna. He knows that tunes, little tunes, pay.

There is but one excuse for Mr. Doblana's petty point of view: his

nationality. He is a Czech, and as such devoid from all sorts of

ideals. It is not his fault if he misunderstands the whole question. It

is his nationality's!"

Doblana had become quite pale.

"What do _you_ know of the question, you Magyar!" he shouted.

Instantly there was a terrific outburst of the whole company. Nobody

would have suspected it a minute before. Nearly all the members of the

Round Table turned against Doblana, who was supported only by two other

Czechs, three or four Italians, and one German: old Hammer. As for the

_Herr Graf_, when I looked for him to see how he was behaving with his

partner, I found that he had disappeared.

One cannot well imagine how fierce the outburst was. My calm English

brain could not understand at all this wild talk, these furious shouts.

I was shocked, I must confess, and I felt a little silly. Evidently

there was no more possibility of reaching a decision this evening. So

with much talk I induced Doblana to leave with me.

As it was not very late, I suggested a stroll which would appease my

agitated host.

The evening was one of those of which we never see an example in our

foggy island, an exquisite spring evening, rapturous and passionately

wonderful. You know the evil smell which fills most big towns just at

that time of the year. Vienna is not so. There is a gust of perfume

which gives spring its true significance.

As we were walking down first the Boulevard, or Ring, as it is called

in Vienna, and then, after having crossed the river, the wide road

which leads to the Prater, I imagined what happiness would be mine if a

certain fair girl was moving by my side instead of her surly father. On

the bridge there stood a lovely flower girl, delayed probably by some

little mishap, with a basket full of red roses and white lilies of the

valley. I would have bought some for Mitzi... Suppose I now offered a

few to the horn-player...!

Was it not perfectly ridiculous to lose my sunny youth walking side by

side with an old man, still smarting from what he considered an insult,

and smarting all the more as there was some truth in what had been said

of him?

We were hardly speaking and I could think freely of the happenings of

this evening which were in a more or less close connexion with what

interested me most.

Yes, it was quite true that Doblana was a money grubber. And money was

the most important question in all his art ... in all his life, I ought

to say. He might, in this respect at least, have been an Englishman, a

Londoner, a City man.

And suddenly I was struck by a thought.

Up to now my idea had been that Mr. Doblana suspected his daughter of

some love affair. Had I myself not felt something like mistrust?

Yet, why did he not say so? Why, if really he was so interested in

questions of money, why did he make such a fuss about a love affair?

So I jumped to the conclusion that there was in Mr. Doblana's mind

no suspicion of any secret amours. What had upset him was certainly

something that had to do with his money glutting.

We were now in the Prater. Never before had this immense park appeared

so beautiful to me. A bench seemed to invite us with open arms to a

short visit. And a bench being in that funny German language a female,

we accepted. Artists are incorrigible.

As soon as we had sat down Mr. Doblana began lamenting.

"I am in bad luck," he said, "that quarrel this evening ought never to

have happened. Somehow I feel that I am surrounded by enemies. There

must be a whole gang of them. I have been lured into this discussion,

and now I have the whole clique of the Germans against me. You have

no idea, Mr. Cooper, what intrigues exist in the theatrical world.

They are all jealous because I happen to make a little money out of my

ballets. They undermine my whole existence. And I have not only a great

many members of the theatrical and musical world against me, but also

most of the Court circles. The majority of the Court do not like to see

the Archduke Alphons Hector writing ballet books for me. They think he

abases himself. They do not know that art never degrades. Of course, he

can bear it easily. But I! All my existence depends on it."

"Can I not help you?" said I, thinking that there had at last arisen

an occasion of capturing that confidence which for weeks I had been

striving to win.

He remained silent. I have told you already that I had little

experience of women. But I must confess that at this moment I noticed

that I had still less experience of men. I felt sure that, if I had

been with a nice girl--I wish he had been a nice girl instead of a

morose, old man--I should have known what to say. Indeed, there are not

many words necessary. But I could not profit by the moon, nor by that

mild night of May, I could not possibly put my arm around his waist and

press him to my manly breast....

After a long while I said at last:

"Can you not trust me, Mr. Doblana?"

"Trust you? Trust you?" he replied. "I cannot even trust my own

daughter, who works with that gang against me! And I should trust you,

a stranger? No, no, Mr. Cooper."

And laughing bitterly he suggested:

"Come, let us go home."

We got up and went. I had learned nothing. I was as ignorant as before.

But....

You will see in the course of this story that you never can confide in

females. And a bench is a female in German. This one was as treacherous

as all of them. It had made me catch a cold. Or rather ... the cold had

caught me.