The person to whom the shapely hand and musical voice belonged, conducted the student along the narrow pa.s.sage to a turning where she halted, under a lamp with a reflector which threw them in that position into the shade. The pa.s.sage was divided by the first lobby, and on the lamp was painted, back to back: "Men," "Ladies;" besides, a babble of feminine voices on the latter side betrayed, as the intruder suspected from the previous placard, that he had entered a place of entertainment by the stage-door, a Tingel-Tangel, or Jingle-Jangle, as we should say.

It was the Jewess who was the Ariadne to this maze. Seen in the light, at close range, with the enchanting smile which a woman always finds for the man who has won her grat.i.tude by supplementing her deficiency in strength and courage with his own, she was worthier love than ever. At this view, too, he was sure that, unlike too many of the _divas_ of these _spielungs_, or dens, she was not one of the stray creatures who sell pleasure to some and give it to others, and for themselves keep only shame--fatal ignominy, wealth at best very unsubstantial, and if, at last, winners, they laugh--one would rather see them weeping.

"What's your name?" she inquired, quickly. "I am Rebecca Daniels, whom they call on the Bills 'La Belle Stamboulane'--though I have never been farther east than Prague," she added with a contemptuous smile. "That was my father, whose maltreatment you so promptly but I fear so severely chastised. But your name?" impatiently.

"I am a student of Wilna University, traveling according to custom of the college, through Germany and to make the Italian Art Tour. I am Claudius Ruprecht."

"Not n.o.ble?" she inquired, sadly, on hearing two Christian names and none of family, for her people treasure the pride of ancestry.

"I am an orphan. I never knew my family. Perhaps, as I am of age, I shall soon be informed. But--"

"Enough! time is getting on, and we cannot long stay in privacy here--the pa.s.sage-way for the performers. This is Freyers' Hall, where I sing--where I was a player. But my father can speak to you in the public room and see to your safety--for I fear this night's affair will end ill. But do not you fear! neither my father nor I have the powerlessness which that n.o.ble ruffian seemed to think is ours. You, at least, shall be saved--even though you killed that brute."

"I do not think that, unless his head is not so hard as his heart."

She opened a narrow door in the dirty wall. It was brighter in the capacious place thus shown.

"Go in and sit down anywhere. My father will be with you in a few minutes. We were so delayed that they feared we would not arrive for 'our turn.' They were glad of the excuse--I fancy they were told it might occur--and they are trying to break our agreement. But never mind!

that is but a bread-and-b.u.t.ter business for us. For you, it will be life and death, if that officer be slain."

Claudius, the student, mechanically obeyed the gentle impulsion her hand imparted to him on the shoulder, and walked through the side-door. A number of benches were before him with corresponding narrow tables, and he sat down at one, and looked round.

He found himself in a very long, rectangular hall, low in the ceiling in proportion to the length, once brightly decorated, but faded, smoked and tarnished. On the walls, in panels, between tinted pilasters of a pseudo-Grecian design, were views of the princ.i.p.al towns of Germany and Austria, the details obliterated in the upper part by smoke and in the lower by greasy heads and hands. Around the sides, a dais held benches and tables similar to those on the floor. At the far end was a bar for beer and other liquors less popular, and an entrance from a main street, screened and indirect, down steps at another level than the rear or stage door. Where Claudius sat was a small stage with footlights and curtain complete, and an orchestra for a miniature piano such as are used in yachts, and six musicians; the performers sat to face the audience respectfully in the good Old German style.

The lighting was by means of cl.u.s.ters of gas-jets at intervals in the long ceiling and along the walls. The announcement of the items of attraction appearing on the stage was made by changeable sliding cards in framework at the sides of the stage; to the left the name of the _scena_ was exhibited, that of the artist on the other.

When Claudius took his seat, the other places were almost all empty; but they soon began to fill up. The majority of the spectators seemed to be of the tradesman and workman cla.s.s, with their wives and daughters, but the stranger, who had been so surrept.i.tiously "pa.s.sed in," was not blind to the presence of a more offensive element. There were faces as villainous as any under the immediate command of Grandmother "Baboushka;" and their dress was not much better. More than one dandy of the gutter nursed the head of a club called significantly the "lawbreaker's canes of crime," with a distant air of the fop sucking his clouded amber k.n.o.b or silver shepherd's-crook. In more than one group were horse-copers, and their kin the market-gardeners' thieves and country wagoners' pests, who not only lighten the loads on the way to the city market on the road, but plunder the drivers after they receive their salesmoney by cheating at cards.

The student, crowded in by this mixed throng, began to doubt the providential quality of the intervention saving him from an explanation to the police; it was very like leaping from the proverbial frying-pan into the fire.

At this stage in his reflections, he felt that a person in the next seat had risen and he soon perceived that he had politely, or from a stronger reason, given up his place to another. This was the old Jew, but he would not have known him by his dress, it was so changed for the better; the fine profile, the venerable beard which an Arab Sheikh would have reverenced, and the sharp, intelligent eyes were unaltered.

"Do you speak Latin?" inquired Daniels in that tongue.

But Claudius, though reading the dead tongue fluently, p.r.o.nounced it after the University manner, and felt that he could not sustain a dialogue with one who followed the Italian usage. He could speak Italian, however, for he had long studied it to be at home in the world of Art.

"The officer was not killed," remarked the Jew, and before his new acquaintance could express his relief, he added gravely, "but he has been spirited away."

"Then it's those vagabonds--"

"Of whom that old _Tausend-Kunstlerin_ (witch of a thousand tricks) is in the position of parent? I guess as much. He said he had connived with her, one who is the actual though occult ruler of the filthy region. We have had to pay her blackmail regularly, like the other artists, for we are obliged to go home after midnight. Well, if he is in their hands, it is among congenial spirits. Tell me your name and as much of your affairs as you please to enlighten me with. I am bound to a.s.sist you as far as possible--though my debt to you will ever remain uncanceled. I am Daniel Daniels, of Odessa, Ma.r.s.eilles, and elsewhere, and an introduction to my correspondent nearest where you sojourn is not to be despised."

Impressed with his tone, the young man related his life-story succinctly.

He had a dreamy remembrance of a long journey, lastly in a sledge, buried in fur robes, his clearer later memories were of a happy home in Poland, in the country, where, though strangers, all were kind to the lonely orphan. There was a mystery about his parentage; his mother was probably a native as he acquired the language as easily as the art of eating, the peasants said. His father had been killed, he thought, on one of those riots which, in a small way, repeat the olden revolutions of Poland against the triumvirate of oppression, Austria, Prussia and Russia. But he had heard a tutor say, when he was not supposed in hearing, that he had perished by the executioner's steel.

"A death honorable as under the bullets," said Claudius, but half doubtingly.

As became a man who abhorred homicide in any shape, Daniels made no reply.

"At the age of eighteen, while at the University, I was given a private tutor in art and architecture, to which I had a bent. He was a Frenchman and I acquired his elegant tongue with that well-known facility of us Poles in attaining proficiency in the Western ones. Armed with that and Italian--"

"Which you speak with finish," interrupted the Jew.

"I expect my Italian and French tour to be delightful. But I am not over the frontier yet, and hardly will be soon if my pa.s.sport is commented upon by an authority cognizant of this night's adventure."

"I regret to find that it was deliberately planned," resumed Daniels.

"My daughter's virtue has raised more hostility under this roof than even her talent. The proprietor is a notorious rascal, but he is too useful to the profligate among the town officials to be reprimanded. The police, too, wink at his personal misdoings, because he is always their friend to deliver the criminals who make this haunt their rendezvous.

All those painted women, as well as the waiter-girls, are spies and Dalilahs who betray the Samsons of crime to the police at any given moment. That would be neither here nor there, however, if my daughter and I were allowed to conclude our engagement--which, believe me, would never have been signed if we had guessed the character of the resort.

Not only would they lodge me in prison for a pretended attempt to elude my contract, but they seek to throw my poor Rebecca into the arms of such reprobates as this Major the Baron. The hag whom you noticed is not unconcerned in the plot. It is a protege of hers--a lovely young girl, guileless in appearance as a cherub, whom they would subst.i.tute for my girl, if she had been detained to-night. In fact--"

He paused. The orchestra had played and two or three vocalists had appeared and sang, without Claudius, absorbed in this conversation, noticing that the entertainment had commenced. A little fat man in a ruffled and embroidered shirt, buff waistcoat with crystal b.u.t.tons, knee breeches and silk stockings of reproachless black, and steel buckled shoes, had come before the curtain, sticking one thumb in his waistband and the other in his vest armhole, to display a huge seal ring and a mammoth diamond hoop, respectively, as well as his idea of ease in company. He announced in a high flute-like voice that in consequence of indisposition, which a sworn medical affirmation confirmed--here he raised a laugh by sticking his tongue in his cheek--"La Belle Stamboulane" would not appear--might have to depart for Constantinople for convalescence, but that the bewitching Fraulein von Vieradlers--one of the few authentic _n.o.ble_ vocalists on the variety stage--following in the footsteps of certain princesses--would oblige, for the first time on any stage, with selections from her repertoire, etc.

This was concerted, for the outburst of applause, started by the most sinister of aspect among the auditors, was vehement and so contagious that the _hussah_ was unanimous as the stage-manager retired.

La Belle Stamboulane was already eclipsed! so evanescent is theatrical fame. Of all the audience, only one felt indignant, and that was the student Claudius, who had not heard her sing or wear stage costumes!

"All is over," observed Daniels placidly. "I cannot cope with these rogues. I must go and join my daughter and get our dresses to our lodgings; thankful if we succeed so far. In about an hour, will you not call, when we will resume our conversation which I wish to have, and with practical gain to you. This is the card of our hotel. It is not aristocratic, but once there, you will be safe."

He spoke with such tranquil a.s.surance that Claudius had not a doubt. He took the card, read the address: "Hotel Persepolitan," so that if he lost the card, it might be in his mind, and nodded with a kind of gratefulness. The father of a beautiful woman is not like any other man in the world to a young man, who is not indifferent to her.

Following the old Jew with his gaze to the narrow side-door leading to behind-the-scenes, Claudius thought that, in the brief period of its opening and closing, he spied the bright black orbs of the Jewess striving to catch a glimpse even so transient of him. It did not need this encouragement to make him resolve to respond to the invitation.

An hour would soon pa.s.s, even in this tedious recreation. He felt also some resentment and curiosity to see the person whom the director of these Munich circeans considered in adequate succession to the peerless Stamboulane. The announcement had at least kindled the public: being plebeian, the promised aristocrat was already discussed. The family was existent, whether this variety vocalist was legitimately a daughter being another question. Vieradlers was a barony that had a right to fly its four eagles--as the name signifies--in the face of the double-headed king of the tribe. The baron was the latest of an old Bavarian line, famous in story. One of his ancestors was eagle-bearer to Caesar after the defeat of Hermann. The continuators had always been near the emperors. There might be a drop of imperial blood in the child who had so strangely degenerated as to prefer royalty on the stage to that of the court and country-house.

"She may be good-looking," thought Claudius, "for I have noticed that where the men are uncomely the women are often the reverse. A Berlin professor has boldly likened the male Bavarian to the gorilla and the caricaturists have taken his cue. They are of the beer-barrel shape, coa.r.s.e, rough, quarrelsome and quick to enter into a fight. It is the national dish of roast goose--a pugnacious bird--and bread of oatmeal that does it. They may well have one beauty of the s.e.x among them. And the carnation on the cheeks of these waitresses is so remarkable that they find rouge superfluous. They are dull, and yet the twinkle in their eyes indicates cunning."

Before him, the next seat was occupied by two gentlemen. They spoke in French, thinking no one would comprehend their conversation. They were discussing the ascending star, about which one had a deeper knowledge than the subjects of Baboushka.

"She is the cause of the disgrace of the Grand-Chamberlain of a northern kingdom," said this well-informed man. "He has been obliged to send in his grand cross of the Royal Order and his rank in the Holy Empire, after what was almost a revolution in the palace. He is a man over sixty, who was in Russia on an important mission, when he met by chance this young girl, whose mother was married to a n.o.ble, although the elder sister of one of those beauties notorious for their depravity in Paris.

Perhaps, though, she secured her husband before her sister won this dubious celebrity. At all events, she lived blamelessly, but _bad_ blood does not lie! This girl seems to aim at the reputation of her aunt, the celebrated Iza, whose portrait was painted, her figure copied in immortal marble, and her charms sung by French bards. At all events, she bewitched the old Count von Raackensee, who took her on a tour through our country and Austria. It was at Vienna that he, an old statesman and courtier, committed the folly of presenting her as his daughter! The truth came out--Austria and Prussia made remonstrances, and he was compelled to resign his office or this witch. He would not give her up and so he was punished."

"Punished?"

"Yes; he went on to live at Nice, where he had bought a villa in foresight for some such day of disgrace. The Circe was to follow him, but, instead of that, she has shaken off the golden links and condescends to stay a week in Munich to amuse us coa.r.s.e swiggers of beer."

CHAPTER IV.

THE STAR IS DEAD LONG LIVE THE STAR!

By listening to others and observing them, man obtains the material for self-preservation. Evidently this star of the minor stage was a woman to be avoided; a rising light which might scar the sight and burn the fingers of too venturesome an admirer. Claudius had a premonition that he ought to go out and kill the few minutes in strolling the streets, before keeping the appointment, even at the risk of being questioned by the police. But he overcame the impulsion, and waited to face what might be a danger the more.

All the hall, by instinct and from the stories circulating--perhaps circulated by the agents of the management--divined that no common attraction was to be presented. Besides, to displace La Belle Stamboulane worthily on the stage, that chosen arena where the female gladiator carries the day, a miracle of beauty, wit and skill was requisite. Elsewhere, ability, practice, art, artifice, many gifts and accomplishments may triumph, but the fifth element as indispensable as the others, air, water, fire and earth--it is _love_, which legitimately monopolizes the theatre for its exhibition and glorification. Men and women come to such places of amus.e.m.e.nt to hear love songs, see love scenes, and share in the fict.i.tious joys and sorrows of love, which they long to enact in reality. Nothing is above love; nothing equals it. He reigns as a master in a temple, with woman as the high-priestess, and man the victim or the chosen reward.