The Street of Seven Stars Part 44

"I have not told the Herr Doktor."

"I thank you."

"But the child dies."

"Jimmy?"

"He dies all of last night and to-day. To-night, it is, perhaps, but of moments."

Harmony clutched at the iron stair-rail for support. "You are sure? You are not telling me so that I will go back?"

"He dies, Fraulein. The Herr Doktor has not slept for many hours. My wife, Rosa, sits on the stair to see that none disturb, and her cousin, the wife of the Portier, weeps over the stove. Please, Fraulein, come with me."

"When did you leave the Siebensternstra.s.se?"

"But now."

"And he still lives?"

"Ja, Fraulein, and asks for you."

Now suddenly fell away from the girl all pride, all fear, all that was personal and small and frightened, before the reality of death. She rose, as women by divine gift do rise, to the crisis; ceased trembling, got her hat and coat and her shabby gloves and joined the sentry again.

Another moment's delay--to secure the Le Grande's address from Monia.

Then out into the night, Harmony to the Siebensternstra.s.se, the tall soldier to find the dancer at her hotel, or failing that, at the Ronacher Music-Hall.

Harmony took a taxicab--nothing must be spared now--bribed the chauffeur to greater speed, arrived at the house and ran across the garden, still tearless, up the stairs, past Rosa on the upper flight, and rang the bell.

Marie admitted her with only a little gasp of surprise. There was nothing to warn Peter. One moment he sat by the bed, watch in hand, alone, drear, tragic-eyed. The next he had glanced up, saw Harmony and went white, holding to the back of his chair. Their eyes met, agony and hope in them, love and death, rapture and bitterness. In Harmony's, pleading, promise, something of doubt; in Peter's, only yearning, as of empty arms. Then Harmony dared to look at the bed and fell on her knees in a storm of grief beside it. Peter bent over and gently stroked her hair.

Le Grande was singing; the boxes were full. In the body of the immense theater waiters scurried back and forward among the tables. Everywhere was the clatter of silver and steel on porcelain, the clink of gla.s.ses.

Smoke was everywhere--pipes, cigars, cigarettes. Women smoked between bites at the tables, using small paper or silver mouthpieces, even a gold one shone here and there. Men walked up and down among the diners, spraying the air with chemicals to clear it. At a table just below the stage sat the red-bearded Dozent with the lady of the photograph. They were drinking cheap native wines and were very happy.

From the height of his worldly wisdom he was explaining the people to her.

"In the box--don't stare, Liebchen, he looks--is the princeling I have told you of. Roses, of course. Last night it was orchids."

"Last night! Were you here?" He coughed.

"I have been told, Liebchen. Each night he sits there, and when she finishes her song he rises in the box, kisses the flowers and tosses them to her."

"Shameless! Is she so beautiful?"

"No. But you shall see. She comes."

Le Grande was very popular. She occupied the best place on the program; and because she sang in American, which is not exactly English and more difficult to understand, her songs were considered exceedingly risque.

As a matter of fact they were merely ragtime melodies, with a lilt to them that caught the Viennese fancy, accustomed to German sentimental ditties and the artificial forms of grand opera. And there was another reason for her success. She carried with her a chorus of a dozen pickaninnies.

In Austria darkies were as rare as cats, and there were no cats! So the little chorus had made good.

Each day she walked in the Prater, ermine from head to foot, and behind her two by two trailed twelve little Southern darkies in red-velvet coats and caps, grinning sociably. When she drove a pair sat on the boot.

Her voice was strong, not sweet, spoiled by years of singing against dishes and bottles in smoky music halls; spoiled by cigarettes and absinthe and foreign c.o.c.ktails that resembled their American prototypes as the night resembles the day.

She wore the gold dress, decolletee, slashed to the knee over rhinestone-spangled stockings. And back of her trailed the twelve little darkies.

She sang "Dixie," of course, and the "Old Folks at Home"; then a ragtime medley, with the chorus showing rows of white teeth and clogging with all their short legs. Le Grande danced to that, a whirling, nimble dance. The little rhinestones on her stockings flashed; her opulent bosom quivered. The Dozent, eyes on the dancer, squeezed his companion's hand.

"I love thee!" he whispered, rather flushed.

And then she sang "Doan ye cry, mah honey." Her voice, rather coa.r.s.e but melodious, lent itself to the negro rhythm, the swing and lilt of the lullaby. The little darkies, eyes rolling, preternaturally solemn, linked arms and swayed rhythmically, right, left, right, left. The gla.s.ses ceased clinking; st.u.r.dy citizens forgot their steak and beer for a moment and listened, knife and fork poised. Under the table the Dozent's hand pressed its captive affectionately, his eyes no longer on Le Grande, but on the woman across, his sweetheart, she who would be mother of his children. The words meant little to the audience; the rich, rolling Southern lullaby held them rapt:--

"Doan ye Cry, mah honey-- Doan ye weep no mo', Mammy's gwine to hold her baby, All de udder black trash sleepin' on the flo',"

The little darkies swayed; the singer swayed, empty arms cradled.

She picked the tiniest darky up and held him, woolly head against her breast, and crooned to him, rocking on her jeweled heels. The crowd applauded; the man in the box kissed his flowers and flung them. Gla.s.ses and dishes clinked again.

The Dozent bent across the table.

"Some day--" he said.

The girl blushed.

Le Grande made her way into the wings, surrounded by her little troupe.

A motherly colored woman took them, shooed them off, rounded them up like a flock of chickens.

And there in the wings, grimly impa.s.sive, stood a private soldier of the old Franz Josef, blocking the door to her dressing room. For a moment gold dress and dark blue-gray uniform confronted each other. Then the sentry touched his cap.

"Madam," he said, "the child is in the Riebensternstra.s.se and to-night he dies."

"What child?" Her arms were full of flowers.

"The child from the hospital. Please to make haste."

Jimmy died an hour after midnight, quite peacefully, died with one hand in Harmony's and one between Peter's two big ones.

Toward the last he called Peter "Daddy" and asked for a drink. His eyes, moving slowly round the room, pa.s.sed without notice the grayfaced woman in a gold dress who stood staring down at him, rested a moment on the cage of mice, came to a stop in the doorway, where stood the sentry, white and weary, but refusing rest.

It was Harmony who divined the child's unspoken wish.

"The manual?" she whispered.

The boy nodded. And so just inside the door of the bedroom across from the old salon of Maria Theresa the sentry, with sad eyes but no lack of vigor, went again through the Austrian manual of arms, and because he had no carbine he used Peter's old walking-stick.

When it was finished the boy smiled faintly, tried to salute, lay still.

CHAPTER XXVII