In fact, the duo between the prima donna and the tenor shortly comes to an end. A short discussion ensues, during which the prima donna alternately scolds the leader, whom she accuses of paying no attention to the _ritardandos_, and the tenor for his "lamentable want of all pa.s.sion."
Morinski throws himself metaphorically between the disputants and kisses the prima donna"s hand. Without paying him much attention, she scans Stella from head to foot, says, with an ironical depression of the corners of her mouth, "Ah! a new star, Morinski!" and withdraws, with an intensely theatrical stride, her loose fur dolman trailing behind her.
"Hm! a new star, Morinski!" the leader repeats also ironically, stuffing an immense pinch of snuff the while into his nose.
"Let us hope so," Morinski replies, with reproving courtesy.
"Is the signorina to sing us something? It is twelve o"clock, Morinski; I am hungry. If it must be, let us be quick. What shall I accompany for you, mademoiselle?"
"_Ah fors" e lui che l"anima!_" Stella says, in a shy whisper, "from----"
"I know, I know,--from Traviata," the leader replies. "You sing it in the original key?"
"Yes."
Almost before Stella has time to take breath, the little man has struck the chords of the prelude. In the midst of the aria he takes his hands from the keys, and shakes his head disapprovingly, so that his long hair flutters about his ears.
"_Eh bien?_" Morinski calls, with some irritation.
"I have heard enough," the other declares, decidedly. "Haven"t you, Morinski? It is a perfectly impossible way to sing,--a perfectly impossible way!"
"Do not be discouraged, Fraulein," says Morinski, rea.s.suringly. "Your voice is superb, full, soft,--one of the finest that I have heard for a long time."
"I do not say no, Morinski," the leader interposes, with the croak of a raven, "but she is absolutely lacking in rhythm, routine, and aplomb."
"She needs a good teacher," says Morinski.
"The teacher has nothing to do with it!" shouts the leader, and with an annihilating stare at Stella he sums up his judgment of her in the words, "_C"est une femme du monde_. You will never make a singer of her!" Then, with the energy that characterizes his every movement, he sets about trying to repair the injury he has just done to his silk hat by brushing it the wrong way.
Poor Stella"s eyes fill with tears. Morinski takes both her hands:
"Do not be discouraged, I beg of you, my dear mademoiselle, I entreat;"
and with an ardent glance at her delicate face he a.s.sures her, "Believe me, you have great qualifications for success on the stage."
"Trust to my experience,--the experience of forty years; you never will succeed on the stage!" shouts the Italian.
"Never mind what he says," Morinski whispers. "I will do all I can for you. I shall take great pleasure in superintending your lessons personally."
But the leader has sharp ears: "_Pas de betises_, Morinski!" He has put on his hat, and is searching with characteristic eagerness in all his pockets. "There is my card," he says, at last, drawing it forth and handing it to the Baroness. "If you want your daughter taught to sing, take her to della Seggiola, Rue Lamartine, No ----, the singing-teacher of the Faubourg Saint-Germain and the Faubourg Saint-Honore, precisely what you want. Refer to me if you like; he will make his charges reasonable for you. _Dio mio_, how hungry I am! _Allons_, Morinski!"
This is the exact history of Stella Meineck"s trial of her voice at the lyric opera in Paris.
The Baroness has just enough sense and prudence left not to allow Stella to take lessons of Morinski.
Following the advice of the energetic Italian, she takes her daughter to Signor della Seggiola.
CHAPTER XX.
THeReSE DE ROHRITZ.
Winter--such winter as Paris is familiar with--has set in, to make itself at home. The gardeners have stripped the squares and public gardens of their last flowers; the trees and the gra.s.s and the bare sod are powdered with snow. When one says "as white" or "as pure" as snow, one must never think of Paris snow, for it is brown, black, gray,--everything except white; and, as if ashamed of its characterless existence, it creeps as soon as possible into the earth.
Full six weeks have pa.s.sed since the Meinecks took up their abode in "The Three Negroes." In order to increase their means, the Baroness has generously determined to write newspaper articles, although she has a supreme contempt for all journalistic effort, and she has also completed two shorter essays, for which the Berlin "Tribune" paid her twenty-five marks.
With a view to making her descriptions of the world"s capital vividly real, she pursues her study of Paris with all the thoroughness that characterizes her study of history. She has visited the Morgue, as well as Valentino"s, note-book in hand, but escorted by an old carpenter, who once mended a trunk for her and won her heart by his sensible way of talking politics. She paid him five francs for his companionship, and maintains that he was far less tiresome at Valentino"s than a fine gentleman. She has devised a most interesting visit shortly to be paid to the Parisian sewers. Meanwhile, in order to make herself perfectly familiar with the life of the streets, she spends three hours daily, two in the forenoon and one in the afternoon, upon the top of various omnibuses.
And Stella,--how does she pa.s.s her time? Four times a week she takes a singing-lesson,--two private lessons, and two in della Seggiola"s "cla.s.s," besides which she practises daily for about two hours at home.
She is at liberty to spend the rest of her time in any mode of self-culture that pleases her. She can go, if she is so inclined, to the Rue Richelieu with her mother, or visit the Louvre alone, can attend to little matters at home, or read learned works and write extracts from them in the book bound in antique leather which her mother gave her upon her birthday.
What wealth of various and interesting occupations and pleasures for a girl of twenty-one! It is quite inconceivable, but nevertheless it is true, that in spite of them she feels lonely and unhappy,--grows daily more nervous and restless, and, without being able to define exactly the cause of her sadness, more melancholy. Her energetic mother, to whom such a vague discontent is absolutely inconceivable, reproaches her with a want of earnestness in her studies and induces a physician to prescribe iron for her.
What is there that iron is not expected to cure?
To-day Stella is again alone at home; her mother has gone out after lunch to take her bird"s-eye view of Paris from the top of an omnibus.
She has graciously offered to take Stella with her, but Stella thanks her and declines; she detests riding in omnibuses, on the top she grows dizzy, and inside she becomes ill.
"Well, I suppose the only thing that would really please you would be to drive in a barouche-and-pair in the Bois," her mother remarks.
"Unfortunately, that I cannot afford." With which she hurries away.
Stella"s throat aches; she often has a throat-ache,--the specific throat-ache of a poor child of mortality who has learned to sing with seven different professors, and whose voice has been treated at different times as a soprano, a mezzo-soprano, and a deep contralto.
She has been obliged to stop practising in consequence, to-day, and has taken up a volume of Gibbon, but is too _distraite_ to comprehend what she reads. It really is strange how slight an interest she takes in the decline of the Roman Empire.
"And if I should not succeed upon the stage, if my voice should not turn out well," she constantly asks herself, "what then? what then?"
Why, for a moment--oh, how her cheeks hum as she recalls her delusion!--she absolutely allowed herself to imagine that---- How bitterly she has learned to sneer at her fantastic dreams!
"Has Edmund Rohritz"s wife not yet been to see you?" Leskjewitsch had asked her mother in a letter shortly before. "You do not know her, but I begged Edgar awhile ago to send her to you,--she would be so advantageous an acquaintance for Stella."
"She would indeed," the poor child thinks; "but not even his old friend"s request has induced him to do me a kindness."
Her sad, weary glance wanders absently over the various lithographs that adorn the walls, portraits of famous singers, Tamberlik, Rubini, Mario, all with the signature of those celebrities. Apparently the hotel must formerly have enjoyed an extensive artistic patronage.
She takes up Gibbon once more, and does her best to become absorbed in the destinies of the tribunes of the people. In vain.
"Good heavens!" she exclaims, irritably, "who could read a serious book in all this noise? And "The Negroes" was recommended to us as a quiet hotel!"
The Deputy from the south of France is pacing the room above her to and fro, now repeating in a murmur and anon declaiming with grotesque pathos to the empty air the speech which he is learning by heart.
In the room next to him an amateur performer is piping "The Last Rose of Summer" on a very hoa.r.s.e flute,--an English bagman, who is suffering from an inflammation of the eyes, wherefore we must not grudge him his musical distractions. He is piping "The Last Rose" for the eighteenth time; Stella has counted.
""Tis beyond endurance!" the girl exclaims, closing her Gibbon. "Ah, heavens, how dreary life is!" she groans. "I wish I were dead!"
Just then there comes a ring at the door. Stella opens it. A tall, smooth-shaven lackey stands in the corridor and hands her a card:
"_La Baronne Edmond de Rohritz, nee Princesse Capito_."