Kitabı oku: «The Devourers», sayfa 19

"Anne-Marie is asleep," said Nancy.

"Then wake her," said the impresario.

Nancy felt herself turning pale.

"Get on," said the impresario; "it won't kill her to play to-night. And the concert-hall is sold out."

"I am sorry," said Nancy; "but Anne-Marie never plays when she is tired."

"That is foolish, my dear woman," said the impresario, getting up. "I shall be obliged to wake her myself if you don't." And he took a step towards the closed door which led into the room where Anne-Marie was sleeping.

Now Anne-Marie's sleep was a sacred thing. A thing watched over and hallowed, approached on tip of toe, spoken of with finger on lip and bated breath. If Anne-Marie slept perfect silence was kept, and the world must stop. If Bemolle chanced to open a door or creak a careless shoe, he was frowned at with horrified brows. Anne-Marie's sleep was a thing inviolate and sacrosanct.

Bemolle had been standing near the window looking out into the darkness while the impresario spoke to Nancy; but with the first step in the direction of the closed door Bemolle darted forward with a growl like that of a angry dog. Bemolle was short and stout, but his long accumulated anger and hatred stood him in lieu of height and muscles. He jumped at the impresario, he pulled his beard, he scratched his face, he pummelled him in the chest, and with short, excited legs he kicked him. When the big man recovered from the amazement caused by this unexpected onslaught, he lifted Bemolle off his legs and sat him on the floor. The he took his hat and his umbrella and walked out of the room, and out of the hotel.

"Has he gone?" said Bemolle, after a while, sitting up, with papery cheeks and a reddened eye.

"Yes, he has gone," said Nancy. "Poor Bemolle! Did he hurt you?"

Bemolle did not rise from the floor. He shook his head, and muttered hoarsely:

"He wanted to wake Anne-Marie. He actually wanted to wake Anne-Marie!"

… It cost them twenty-five thousand francs to annul the contract, and five hundred francs in legal expenses. But they considered that it was cheap for the joy of having got rid of the impresario.

They had picnics and played about until Fräulein was well enough to join them again, and then they went to Rome, where they arrived with a fortnight to spare before the orchestral concerts at the Teatro Costanzi.

Thither from Milan came Aunt Carlotta, bent and wrinkled, and Zio Giacomo, trembling and slow; and Adèle and Nino and Carlo and Clarissa in a noisy and affectionate group. Many tender tears were shed in memory of Valeria, who had not lived to see her little grandchild's fame. "But she saw your glory, Nancy," said Nino.

They lived again in memory Nancy's visit to the Queen with her little volume of poems, as they all went one sunshiny afternoon up the hill of the Quirinal and past the Palace. Nino, whose hair was quite grey, and who, according to Aunt Carlotta, was rather difficult to please and easy to irritate, walked in front of them, and Anne-Marie trotted beside him, holding his hand. He told her interesting tales about a pink pinafore her mother had worn when she was eight years old, and what Fräulein looked like when she was apple-cheeked and twenty-five. Fräulein, who really did not show the twenty years' difference very much, walked beside them, deeply moved by these reminiscences; and Bemolle, who was to go and visit his lonely old mother as soon as the Costanzi concerts were over, walked behind them all, tearful on general principles.

"By the way," said Nino to Nancy, "I saw the dear old Grey House again. I went to England on Carlo's affairs two months ago. I ran down to Hertfordshire and looked at it. It seemed to be empty."

"Oh," said Fräulein, "what a beautiful place it was! Don't you remember it, Nancy?"

"I remember the garden," said Nancy, with vague eyes, "and the swing–"

"What swing?" said Anne-Marie, taking an interest.

Nancy told her about the swing in the orchard of that far-away home, where she had stood swinging and singing in the placid English sunshine when she was a little girl.

… After a very few days the well-remembered envelope with the golden arms of the Royal House was put into Anne-Marie's small hands. On the following evening, Adèle, Carlotta, and Clarissa were in a flutter preparing Nancy and Anne-Marie for their audience at the Quirinal. Bemolle was fevered with excitement, for he was to play Anne-Marie's accompaniments on the piano. He walked, pale and happy, carrying the violin and the music, behind Nancy and Anne-Marie, as they passed, with right hands bared, through the red room, and the yellow room, and the blue room, and at last into the white and gold room where the King and the Queen and many officers and ladies were waiting for them. The Queen was not the same Queen whom Nancy had known, and whose name—the name of a flower—was written on the first page of her old diary. But the little boy whose picture, framed in diamonds, Nancy had received on her wedding-day, was King.

The Queen embraced Anne-Marie many times, and laughed when Anne-Marie talked, and wept when Anne-Marie played. Anne-Marie gazed at the tall, dark-eyed Queen with adoration, sparing a glance or two for a gorgeous man in scarlet tunic, with many decorations, whom she took to be the King.

As the Adagio of Mendelssohn's concerto ended, a stern-faced man in plain evening-dress, sitting slightly apart from the others, said: "I do not care much for music, but this music I love." The Queen turned to him with a smile on her beautiful face—a smile that startled Anne-Marie. Anne-Marie followed the track of that shining smile, and her eyes fastened on the face of the stern man. Where had she seen that face before? Why was it so dear and familiar? Why did it make her think of New York, and her mother weeping over letters from home. Stamps! She had seen it on stamps! He was the King of Italy! How could she have looked at that silly, yellow-haired man in the red tunic! Anne-Marie's small loyal heart prostrated itself in penitence before him who did not care for music. And as she played, he smiled back at her with piercing, friendly eyes.

Bemolle, who had made his deep obeisance on entering the door, and had then stopped beside the piano, bent under the awful joy of the majestic presence, never straightened himself out again, but sat down and stood up when spoken to, in a tense curvilinear posture that was painful to look upon. He also played many wrong notes in the accompaniments, and could feel the anger of Anne-Marie flashing upon him, even though her small blue back was turned. Nancy sat beside the Queen, smiling through tear-lit eyes, replying to the many intimate and kindly questions the beautiful lips asked. The Queen addressed her by her maiden name that was famous, and quoted her poems to her with softly cadenced voice; and the past and the present melted into one in Nancy's heart, and she could not separate their beauty.

They drove back to the hotel in moved and grateful spirit. Anne-Marie, fluffy and feathery in her mother's arms, chatted all the way home, for she had much to say.

XXIV

A year of dream-like travels from triumph to triumph, from success to success, scattered roses and myrtles at the feet of Anne-Marie. She went through life as a child wanders through a fairy-tale garden, alight with flowers that bow and bend to her hand. The concerts were her joy. Music filled her soul to overflowing, and, like a pure and chosen vessel, Anne-Marie poured it forth again upon the listening world. When she played she was fulfilling her destiny, as a lark must sing.

One day in Genoa she was taken to see Paganini's violin, hanging mute and sealed in its glass case at the town hall. She looked at it silently and turned away.

"What are you thinking, dear heart?" said Nancy. "You look so sad."

"I am thinking," said Anne-Marie, with solemn eyes, "how it must hurt that violin and ache it, to be kept locked up, and not be allowed to sing!"

The remark was heard, and repeated, and reached the ears of the Mayor of Genoa. One afternoon, with great pomp, Anne-Marie was invited to the palace of the Municipio, and, before a few invited guests, the seals were broken, and the hallowed instrument of the immortal Nicolò was placed in the little girl's hands. Anne-Marie had not slept for three nights thinking of that moment, imagining the joy of the imprisoned voice when her hands should let it loose.

She drew a new E string quickly over the tarnished bridge. Now she plucked lightly at it, bending her head to listen. Then, raising her bow, she struck the bonds of silence from the quivering strings. The chord in D minor rippled out, hoarse and feeble. Anne-Marie struck a second chord, pressing down her fingers with a vehement vibrato. Again the reply came—muffled, quavering, weak. Anne-Marie's face grew white and tense. She removed the violin from her shoulder with a little sob.

"It is dead," she said.

Years after, if ever Nancy thought that it might have been better had Anne-Marie been held back, and not been allowed to play her heart out to the world, the memory of the Silent Violin, locked in its glass case, came back to her—the violin that had died of its own silence. And she was glad that her little skylark had been allowed to sing.

And sing it did, in many climes and under many skies. Was it in Turin that the horses were taken from the carriage, and Anne-Marie and Nancy drawn in triumph through the cheering, waving streets? Was it in Bern that the police had to hold the crowd back, and clear the squares for their plunging horses to pass? Where was it that she was serenaded and called to the balcony twenty times by a crowd that seemed to have gone mad? Where did men lift little children up that they might touch her dress, and women, jostled in the crowd, with hats awry, fight for a glimpse of the fair nodding head, for a touch of the little gloved hand? Was it at Naples that they called her la bambino, assistita, and thought her possessed by a spirit, and begged her to predict to them the winning numbers of the following Saturday's lottery?

Yes, that was in Naples. In the confused glory of the shifting scenes some memories stood out clearly, and held Nancy's recollection. It was in Naples that no seat had been reserved for her in the immense and crowded concert-hall, and that the manager had told her of a lady who would give her a seat in her own box: box 5, tier 2—Nancy remembered it still. And when Anne-Marie, duly kissed and blessed, stepped out, violin in hand, upon the platform, Nancy was still running along the empty corridors of tier 2, looking for box 5. Here it was! There was a lady in it alone. Nancy bowed to her and took her seat, murmuring: "Grazie." Then, with tightly folded hands, she had whispered the little prayer she always said for God to help Anne-Marie. And, as always, the prayer was answered, for Anne-Marie played grandly and suavely, never even dreaming that help could be needed.

Nancy sat in the box, tense and terrified as usual, waiting for the tranquil eyes of Anne-Marie to wander round the auditorium and find her. There! They found her, and shone and twinkled. Then the Spirit of Music dropped its great wings between them, and carried away little Anne-Marie, swinging and singing her out of reach—out of reach of her mother's love, farther than Nancy could follow.

The lady in black took her pocket-handkerchief and pressed it to her eyes. Nancy was used to the gesture, but it always moved her. She put her hand lightly on the arm of the unknown woman whose heart her little girl's music had wrung.

The last piece was ended, and the well-known cries of applause were starting from all corners of the house, when Nancy rose quickly to go back to Anne-Marie. The woman in black put back her veil, and said:

"My name is Villari."

Nancy remembered the name. All that Aldo had told, all that Nino had not told, years ago swept into her mind. She looked curiously into the tired face, under its helmet of dark-red tinted hair. There were many lines in the face. Nancy thought it looked like a map, and along the many little lines Nancy's eyes seemed to travel into a sad and distant country. She put out her hand.

"I know your name well," said Nancy. "I salute the great artist."

The woman sighed deeply. "I salute the happy mother," she said. Then she pulled down her veil and turned away.

Nancy hastened along the crowded corridors, where people in groups were discussing her little daughter, and the words, "wonderful! marvellous! incredible!" beat with their accustomed soft wing on her ears.

"Happy mother!" Oh yes, she was a happy mother! She said it over and over again, and repeated it to herself as she tied the soft woollen scarf round Anne-Marie's head, and again as they made their way through the cheering crowd, and the outstretched hands, and the waving hats. She repeated it as she sat in the motor open to the balmy Neapolitan night, and held Anne-Marie tightly as she stood up on the seat, waving both small hands to the surrounding throng. The little standing figure swayed as the carriage moved swiftly down the street. Soon the shouting people were left behind, and Anne-Marie slid down to her place near her mother. Beyond the Gulf, Vesuvius breathed its glowing rhythmic breath, and the waters glittered. Nancy remembered that this was Aldo's birthplace; and then she forgot it in the lilt of the usual dulcet words:

"Did you like my concert, mother dear?"

The phrase had now become a formula which they repeated laughingly like the refrain of a song. Of all the hours of the rushing turbulent day, this was the hour of joy for Nancy. Anne-Marie, who was elfish and impish, made strange by her music, and made wild by the worship of many people, in this one hour became a little tender child again, softer and sweeter than the day-time Anne-Marie, nearer and more human than the concert Anne-Marie, who was a strange, inaccessible being that Nancy sometimes thought could not really belong to her.

Fräulein and Bemolle followed them in another carriage. No one since the impresario had ever dared to intrude upon this sacred starlit hour of their love.

Did Nancy's heart ever regret her own hopes of glory? Did she remember her unwritten Book? Did she feel the wounded place of the wings that she had torn out? Never! She lived for Anne-Marie and in Anne-Marie. Little by little the chimera of inspiration drew away from her. She forgot that she had once clasped Fame to her own breast. No words, no visions, no dreams haunted her any more. She breathed in the music Anne-Marie played. She dreamed the music Anne-Marie composed. The Pied Piper had passed her; his call dragged at her soul no more. The eagle of her genius no more shook and shattered her with the wild beating of his wings. She was like the Silent Violin—the music that her soul had not sung was dead.

XXV

It was in Paris that what Nancy had so often vaguely dreaded and expected happened at last. She was alone in the hotel in her own quiet sitting-room when the lift-boy knocked at the door, and on her careless response a visitor was ushered in. It was Aldo—Aldo with a square beard and a dangling eyeglass, hat in hand, and faultlessly attired.

He stood before her, gazing at her face. Then he put his hat on a chair, extended both hands, and said in a deep, fervent voice:

"Nancy!"

Nancy had risen with quick, indrawn breath, and stood, slim and pale, in her soft-tinted dressing-gown. He took another step towards her, still with both hands outstretched. Nancy put out a diffident hand, and her husband clasped it fervently in both his own. On his little finger was a diamond ring. He bent his sleek black head over Nancy's hand and kissed it.

"Thank God!" he murmured, and sank into a chair.

Nancy wondered what he was thanking God for. Aldo himself was not very clear about it, but it seemed an appropriate thing to say. And he had nothing else ready. The embarrassing silence was broken by Aldo. He said:

"Nancy, I have returned!"

Nancy said, "Yes," and thought disconnected thoughts about his beard and his diamond ring.

"You have thought cruel thoughts of me during all this time?"

No, Nancy had not thought cruel thoughts.

"You have left off loving me?"

Nancy looked at him with vague, dazed eyes, and smiled without knowing why. Aldo tried not to notice the smile. He said:

"Will you never forgive me?"

"Oh yes, I suppose so," said Nancy; and she smiled again.

She thought it funny that this strange man with the square beard and the dangling eyeglass should be asking her to forgive him, and questioning her about love. Nothing about him seemed in the least familiar. His hair, that used to be parted in the middle, now waved back from his forehead; his fan-shaped beard altered his face and made him look like a Frenchman; even his hat, square and high and narrow-rimmed, lying on her chair, had in it an element of utter strangeness.

"What are you laughing at?" said Aldo. And some tone of offended vanity in his voice startled her memory, and suddenly it was up and awake.

"I am not laughing," said Nancy, and she began to cry. That was the attitude that Aldo had expected, and knew how to cope with. A cold, light-eyed woman with an ambiguous smile was an uncomfortable and uncertain thing. But a woman in tears was a sight he had often seen, and he understood the meaning of the bowed head and the significance of the hidden face. He was beside her, his arm round her narrow shoulders. "Nancy, don't cry, don't cry! I have been a brute. But I will atone. I will repay you in happiness a thousandfold for all that you have suffered!"

Still she wept with her face hidden in her hands.

"I am rich. I have more money than we shall know how to spend."

The heaving shoulders stopped heaving. They seemed to be waiting, listening. There was distrust in those waiting shoulders, so he hurried out:

"It is all right. I have not gambled or done anything disreputable. The money has been left to me"—still the shoulders waited—"by a—by—an old person whom I befriended. She has died and left me her money. I deserved it. I was very good to her—"

The shoulders heaved again in a deep sigh. Relief? Despair? Aldo was uncertain.

"So all your troubles are at an end, Nancy. I have settled enough on you and the child, so that you need no more exploit Anne-Marie."

Nancy started up and away from him. "Exploit Anne-Marie!" … Exploit Anne-Marie! Was that what he thought? Was that what other people thought?—that she was exploiting Anne-Marie?

Nancy covered her face again and burst into wild, uncontrollable sobs of grief. She cried loud, like a child, and Aldo felt that these were not the tears that he was used to and understood.

In these tears were all Nancy's broken hopes and lost aspirations, all that she had sacrificed and stifled and tried with prayers and fastings, for Anne-Marie's sake, not to regret. Her work, her Book, her hopes of Fame, her dreams of Glory, all that she had given up for love of Anne-Marie, laid down for Anne-Marie's little feet to trample on, stood up in her memory like murdered things. She remembered the beating wings of her own genius that she had torn out in order not to impede Anne-Marie in her flight, and the wounds burned and bled again.

"I have not been exploiting Anne-Marie," she said, raising her tear-merged eyes to Aldo. "All that she has earned in her concerts has been put away for her. It is sacrosanct. No one has touched it."

"Then how have you lived?" he said.

"I have borrowed money," she said defiantly and angrily. "A lot of money, which I shall repay when I can."

"From whom?" asked Aldo. Nancy did not answer.

"You can repay it now," said Aldo, frowning. And then he was silent.

The frivolous hotel clock struck four in tinkling chimes.

"Where is Anne-Marie?" asked Aldo, in a low voice.

"She is out." And Nancy's face grew hard as stone. "I do not want her to see you. She is not to be excited and upset."

"Nancy!"—and Aldo's nostrils went white—"you must let me see her. I have longed for her day and night for the past three years. I have thought of nothing else. I have lain awake hours every night planning the meeting with her. When I should be free, when I should be rich"—Nancy flinched and shivered—"I thought of finding you struggling and in need. And I planned our meeting. I was going to send something to her—with no name—every day for a week beforehand, every day something better than the day before. The first day only a box of sweets, or of toys. Then a cageful of singing birds. Then a bank book with money, and the last day"—Aldo's eyes were full of tears now, but Nancy's were dry and hard—"it was to be a pony-carriage with two white ponies and a stiff little groom sitting behind"—Aldo's voice broke—"and that was to fetch you both away, away from poverty, and misery, and loneliness, and bring you back to me!"

Aldo covered his face with his hands, and his tears fell over the diamond ring.

"Then I heard … I read … about Anne-Marie … and I would not go to hear her. I could not go, I could not sit alone … and see my own little girl … standing there … playing to a thousand strangers … while I, her father–" He became incoherent with grief.

"And I have never heard her, never heard her," he sobbed.

Nancy's lips were shut, and her heart was shut. She did not speak.

Aldo looked at her through his swimming orbs, and wished that she would weep too. He spoke in a broken whisper.

"Am I not to be forgiven? Can we not all be happy again?"

"No," said Nancy.

"Do you mean never?" asked Aldo, and his beard worked strangely.

"Never," said Nancy, and a shudder of dislike tightened her elbows to her side.

Then Aldo raved and wept. He had dreamed of this meeting for three years; he had always loved her; he had always loved Anne-Marie; he had done what he had done for her sake and for Anne-Marie; he had saved, and skimped, and schemed for her and for Anne -Marie; he could not have lived but for the thought of her and of Anne-Marie; and he would not live a day longer unless it were with her and with Anne-Marie!

As he spoke thus it was truth, and became truer while he said it, and while he saw her and felt that she would never be anything in his life again.

"Oh, Nancy! Nancy! Nancy!" He grasped her cold, limp hand, and crushed it in his own. "You will let me see Anne-Marie. You cannot refuse it! I shall abide by what she says. If she does not want me I will go away. But if she wants me—if she remembers me and says that I may stay—promise me that you will let me! Promise! promise! I will not leave you—I will not leave you until you promise!"

Nancy would not promise.

"Nancy, remember how we loved each other! Remember the days on Lake Maggiore! Remember when you were writing your Book, and you used to read it to me in the evening with your head against my arm. Remember everything, Nancy, and promise that I may see Anne-Marie, and that if she is willing you will let me stay. Promise, Nancy, promise!"

But Nancy would not promise.

"Nancy, have you forgotten the hard times in New York? The hunger and the misery we went through together? For the sake of those dark days, the days in the old Schmidls' house, and in the little flat; for the sake of my dreary little dark room, that I have since so often longed for and regretted, because I could see you and the child asleep through the open door … will you not promise, Nancy?"

No; Nancy could not promise.

"Do you remember when Anne-Marie had the measles?" sobbed Aldo. "And she would only eat the food I cooked?… And she would only go to sleep if she held my finger and I sang, 'Celeste Aïda!' to her?… Will you remember that, and will you promise?"

Nancy remembered that. And she promised.

They sat waiting for Anne-Marie to come back from her walk. Neither spoke; but Aldo took a little picture-postcard of Anne-Marie with her violin that lay on the table, and held it in his hand, gazing at it with his elbow on his knee. Then his head drooped, and he sat with his forehead pressed against the little picture.

The unconscious Arbiter of Destinies came running along the hotel passage with a balloon from the Bon Marché tied to her wrist. It was a large red balloon with the words "Bon Marché" in gold letters on it, and it had caused Fräulein intense mortification as she had walked beside it down the Boulevard des Italiens to the hotel.

"People will recognize you," she had said to Anne-Marie in the street, "and they will not take you and your music seriously any more. It is not for a great artist to walk about with a stupid balloon."

"It is not stupider than any other balloon," said Anne-Marie, slapping its red inflated head, and watching it ascend slowly to the length of its string. Then she pulled it down again, and a slight puff of wind made it knock lightly against Fräulein's cheek.

Fräulein was exceedingly vexed. "I cannot imagine how any one who plays the Beethoven Sonata—"

"Which Sonata?" asked Anne-Marie, who was an adept at changing the conversation. "The Kreutzer or the Frühling? I prefer the Kreutzer."

Then she forcibly inserted her fingers under Fräulein's hard and resisting arm, and trotted gaily beside her. The balloon bumped lightly against Fräulein's hat, but Fräulein did not mind; she merely said that she would have preferred if "Louvre" had been written on it instead of "Bon Marché," which looked so cheap.

Anne-Marie now entered the sitting-room, balloon in hand. Fräulein, seeing a visitor there, withdrew to her room.

Anne-Marie was used to people calling on her and waiting for her. She put out a small warm hand to the stranger, who had started to his feet, and was looking at her with vehement, tearful eyes.... Anne-Marie had seen many strangers and many tearful eyes. She was not moved or surprised.

"Bon jour," she said, judging by the beard.

Then she went to her mother. "Look at my balloon, Liebstes," she said, slipping the string off her wrist. The balloon rose quickly and gently, and before it could be stopped it was knock-knocking against the ceiling. Anne-Marie's despairing eyes followed it. The room was high. The piece of string hung beyond human reach. Then the man with the beard took her hand, and said:

"Anne-Marie!"

Anne-Marie drew her hand away, rubbing it lightly against her dress.

He again said: "Anne-Marie!" in a hoarse voice, with his hands clasped together. "Look at me," he said, and the blue eyes obediently left the ceiling and rested on his face. "Do you remember me?"

"Yes," said Anne-Marie promptly and unveraciously. She had often been chided by Fräulein for saying an abrupt "no" on these occasions. "It is rude to say 'no' and it hurts people's feelings. You must say: 'I am not sure … I think I remember …' Fräulein had admonished. "Oh, if I must not say no, I had better say yes," said Anne-Marie, who believed in being brief. And so she did on this occasion.

The hot blood had rushed like a flame to Aldo's face. He dropped upon his knee and took her hands, pressing them to his eyes, and to his forehead, and to his lips. "My little girl! My little girl!" he said, and the quick southern tears flowed. Anne-Marie said to herself: "He must be a German musician." Only German musicians had been as demonstrative as this. And she looked round to her mother, but her mother's face was turned away.

"May I stay—may I stay, Anne-Marie? You don't want me to go away again, do you? Tell your mother that you want me to stay with you and take care of you!"

Now it was for Anne-Marie to be bewildered.

"I don't want to be taken care of, thank you," she said, as politely as she could.

Aldo laughed through his tears. "Dear, funny little child of mine," he cried, kissing her hand and her sleeve.

Anne-Marie was matter-of-fact. "Good-bye," she said decisively. "If you want an autograph, I will give you one."

Aldo caught her by both arms, gazing into her face with blurred eyes. "Anne-Marie! Anne-Marie! you said you remembered me! Don't you know who I am? Don't you remember your father, Anne-Marie, who used to sing 'Celeste Aïda, forma divina' to you when you were ill, and who took you to see the squirrels in the park? Anne-Marie, don't you remember me?"

Anne-Marie's underlip trembled. She shook her head. Aldo rose from his knees. He turned away and hid his face in his hands.

Anne-Marie tiptoed to her mother's side, and nestled in her encircling arm. Then her eyes wandered upwards in search of the balloon. There it was, close to the ceiling. Anne-Marie thought that it looked smaller than it was before. She wondered how she would ever get it down again.

Nancy had turned her face—a pinched white face that also looked smaller, thought Anne-Marie—towards her, and spoke in a low voice.

"Anne-Marie, he is your father."

"Is he?" said Anne-Marie, glancing at the tall figure with the sloping shoulders and the hidden face, and then at the hat on the chair.

"Shall he stay with us?" questioned Nancy under her breath.

"With us two?" asked Anne-Marie, with round, troubled eyes, and remembering the impresario.

"With us two."

"For always?" and Anne-Marie's eyes were larger and more troubled.

"For always," said Nancy.

Anne-Marie glanced at the man again and at the hat again. Then she put her cheek against her mother's arm, as she always did, when she asked a favour. "Rather not, Liebstes," she whispered.

The Arbiter had spoken.

Aldo said only a few words more to Nancy. He placed his hands on Anne-Marie's head, and looked at her a long time. Then he turned suddenly, took up his square hat, and left the room.

"That was a strange man," said Anne-Marie. "Was he really my father?"

Nancy, with pale lips, said: "Yes."

"Are you sure?" questioned Anne-Marie, raising her eyes to the balloon.

"Yes, dear," said Nancy; and her tears fell.

Suddenly Anne-Marie flew to the door. "Father!" she cried in a shrill treble voice.

Aldo, on the stairs, heard and stood still. His hand gripped the bannisters, his heart leaped to his throat.

"Father!"

He turned slowly, doubtingly.

"Father!" came the treble voice again; and he mounted the steps, and went trembling and stumbling along the passage. Anne-Marie was standing at the door.