Her morning-room was hung with Japanese umbrellas and, despite the
warning of friends, peacock-feathers hid from view the walls; this
comfortable little boudoir, with its rugs, cozy Turkish corner, and dull
sweet odors was originally a hall-bedroom; Tekla's ingenuity and
desperate desire for the unconventional had converted the apartment into
the prettiest of the Calcraft flat. Here, and here alone, was the
imperious critic forbidden pipe or cigar. Cigarettes he abhorred,
therefore Tekla allowed her favorites to use them. She became sick if
she merely lighted one; so her pet attitude was to loll on a crimson
divan and hold a freshly rolled Russian cigarette in her big fingers
covered with opals. Her male friends said that she reminded them of a
Frankish slave in a harem; she needed nothing more but Turkish-trousers,
hoop ear-rings, and the sad, resigned smile of the captive maiden....
It was half-past five in the dark, stormy afternoon when the electric
buzzer warned Tekla of visitors. A man was ushered into the drawing-room
and Magda, in correct cap and apron, fetched his card to her mistress.
"Show him in here, Magda, and Magda"--there were languid intonations in
the voice of this vigorous woman--"light that lamp with the green
globe."
In the fast disappearing daylight Tekla peeped at herself in a rhomboid
crystal mirror, saw her house frock, voluminously becoming, and her
golden hair set well over her brow: she believed in the eternal charm of
fluffiness. After the lamp was ready the visitor came in. He was a very
tall, rather emaciated looking, blond young man, whose springy step and
clear eyes belied any hint of ill-health. As he entered, the gaze of the
two met in the veiled light of the green-globed lamp, and the fire
flickered high on the gas-log hearth. He hesitated with engaging
modesty; then Tekla, holding out a hand, moved in a large curved way, to
meet him.
"Delighted, I am sure, my dear Herr Viznina, to know you! How good of
you to call on such a day, to see a bored woman." He bowed, smiled,
showing strong white teeth under his boyish moustache, and sat down on
the low seat near her divan.
"Madame," he answered in Slavic-accented English, "I am happy to make
your acquaintance and hope to meet your husband, M. Calcraft." She
turned her head impatiently. "I only hope that his notice will not
discourage you for Tristan to-morrow night. But Mr. Calcraft is really a
kind man, even if he seems severe in print. I tell him that he always
hangs his fiddle outside the door, as the Irish say, which means, my
dear Herr Viznina, that he is kinder abroad than at home." Seeing the
slightly bewildered look of her companion she added, "And so you didn't
mind his being cross this morning, did you?" The tenor hesitated.
"But he was not cross at all, Madame; I thought him very kind; for my
throat was rough--you know what I mean! sick, sore; yes, it was a real
sore throat that I had last night." It was her turn to look puzzled.
"Not cross? Mr. Calcraft not severe? Dear me, what do you call it,
then?"
"He said I was a great artist," rejoined the other.
Tekla burst into laughter and apologized. "You have read the wrong
paper, Herr Viznina, and I am glad you have. And now you must promise to
stay and dine with us to-night. No, you sha'n't refuse! We are quite
alone and you must know that, as old married folks, we are always
delighted to have some one with us. I told Mr. Calcraft only this
morning that we should go out to dinner if he came home alone. Don't ask
for which paper he writes until you meet him. Nothing in the world could
make me tell you." She was all frankness and animation, and her guest
told himself that she was of a great charm. They fell into professional
talk. She spoke of her husband's talents; how he had played the viola in
quartet parties; of his successful lecture, "The Inutility of Wagner,"
and his preferences in music.
"But if he does not care for Wagner he must be a Brahmsianer." The last
word came out with true Viennese unction.
"He now despises Brahms, and thinks that he had nothing to say. Wagner
is, for him, a decadent, like Liszt and the rest."
"But the classics, Madame, what does M. Calcraft write of the classics?"
demanded the singer.
"That they are all used-up romantics; that every musical dog has his
day, and the latest composer is always the best; he voices his
generation. We liked Brahms yesterday; to-day we are all for Richard
Strauss and the symphonic poem."
"_We?_" A quizzical inflection was in the young man's voice. She stared
at him.
"I get into the habit of using the editorial 'we.' I do it for fun; I by
no means always agree with my husband. Besides, I often write criticism
for Mr. Calcraft when he is away--or lecturing." She paused.
"Then," he exclaimed, and he gazed at her tenderly, "if you like my
Tristan you may, perhaps, write a nice little notice. Oh, how lovely
that would be!"
The artist in him stirred the strings of her maternal lyre. "Yes, it
would be lovely, but Mr. Calcraft is not lecturing to-morrow night, and
I hope that--"
The two street doors banged out a half bar of the Hunding rhythm.
Calcraft was heard in the hall. A minute later he stood in the door of
his wife's retreat; there was a frown upon his brow when he saw her
companion, but it vanished as the two men shook hands. Viznina asked him
if he spoke German; Magda beckoned to Mrs. Calcraft from the middle of
the drawing-room. When Tekla returned, after giving final instructions
for dinner, she found critic and tenor in heated argument over Jean de
Reszké's interpretation of the elder Siegfried....
The dining-room was a small salon, oak-panelled, and with low ceilings.
A few prints of religious subjects, after the early Italian masters,
hung on the walls. The buffet was pure renaissance. Comfortable was the
room, while the oval table and soft leather chairs were provocative of
appetite and conversation.
"Very un-American," remarked the singer, as he ate his crab bisque.
"How many American houses have you been in?" irritably asked Calcraft.
Viznina admitted that he was enjoying his début.
"I thought so." Calcraft was now as bland as a May morning, and his eyes
sparkled. His wife watched Magda serve the fish and fowl, and her
husband insisted upon champagne as the sole wine. The tenor looked
surprised, and then amused.
"Americans love champagne, do they not? I never touch it."
"Would you rather have claret or beer?" hastily inquired the host.
"Neither; I must sing Tristan to-morrow."
"You singers are saints on the stage." The critic laughed. "I am
old-fashioned enough to believe that good wine or beer will never hurt
the throat. Now there was Karl Formes, and Niemann the great tenor--"
Tekla interrupted. "My dear Cal, pray don't get on one of your
interminable liquid talks. Herr Viznina does not care to drink, whether
he is singing or not. I told him, too, that we always liked a guest at
dinner, for we are such old married people."
Calcraft watched the pair facing one another. He was in a disagreeable
humor because of his wife's allusion to visitors; he liked to bear the
major burden of conversation, even when they were alone. If Tekla began
he had to sit still and drink--there was no other alternative. She asked
Viznina where he was born, where he had studied, and why he had changed
his name. The answers were those of a man in love with his art. Hinweg,
he explained, was his mother's name, and assumed because of the
anti-Slav prejudice existing in Vienna.
Calcraft broke in. "You say you are Bohemian, Herr Viznina? You are
really as Swedish looking as Mrs. Calcraft."
"What a Sieglinde she would make, with her beautiful blond complexion
and grand figure," returned the tenor with enthusiasm.
Tekla sighed for the third time that day. She burned to become a Wagner
singer. Had she not been a successful elocutionist in Minnesota? How
this talented young artist appreciated her gift, intuitively understood
her ambition! Calcraft noted that they looked enough alike to be brother
and sister; tall, fair and blue-eyed as they were. He laughed at the
conceit.
"You are both of the Wölfing tribe," he roared and ordered beer of
Magda. "I always drink dark beer after champagne, it settles the
effervesence," he argued.
"You can always drink beer, before and after anything, Cal," said his
wife in her sarcastic, vibrant voice.
The guest was hopelessly bored, but, being a man of will, he
concentrated his attention upon himself and grew more resigned. He did
not pretend to understand this rough-spoken critic, with his hatred of
Wagner and his contradictory Teutonic tastes. Tekla with eyes full of
beaming implications spoke:
"I should tell you, Cal, that Herr Viznina does not know, or else has
forgotten, which paper you write for, and I let him guess. He thinks you
praised his Siegmund."
"Saturday morning after the Tristan performance he will know for sure,"
answered the critic sardonically, drinking a stein of Würzburger.
"You rude man! of course he will know, and he will love you afterwards."
If Calcraft had been near enough she would have tapped him playfully on
the arm.
"Ah! Madame, what would we poor artists do if it were not for the
ladies, the kind, sweet American ladies?"
"That's just it," cried Calcraft.
"What an idea, Warrington Calcraft!" Tekla was thoroughly indignant.
"Never since I've known you have I attempted to influence you."
"You couldn't," said he.
"No, not even for poor Florence Deliba, who entered into a suicidal
marriage after she read your brutal notice of her début."
"And a good thing it was for the operatic stage," chuckled the man.
"If I write the notices of a few minor concerts I always try to follow
your notions." She was out of breath and Viznina admired her without
reserve.
Calcraft was becoming slow of utterance. "You women are wonders when it
comes to criticism." The air darkened. Viznina looked unhappy and Mrs.
Calcraft rose: "Come, let us drink our coffee in my den, Herr Viznina, I
hate shop talk." She swept out of the room and the tenor, after a
dismissal from the drowsy critic, joined her.
"My headstrong husband doesn't care for coffee," she confessed,
apologetically. "Sit down where you were before. The soft light is so
becoming to you. Do you know that you have an ideal face for Tristan,
and this green recalls the forest scene. Now just fancy that I am Isolde
and tell me what your thoughts and feelings are in the second act."
Sitting beside her on the couch and watching her long fingers
milky-green with opals, Viznina spoke only of himself, with all the
meticulous delicacy of a Wagnerian tenor, and was thoroughly happy
playing the part of a tame Tristan.