And she shooed the five men out of the bedroom.
“I must get up. I won’t dance. I will be a dummy. But I must be there. It is too dre-eadful, too dre-eadful!” wailed Madame.
“Don’t take any notice of them. They can manage by themselves. Men are such babies. Let them carry it through by themselves.”
“Children—they are all children!” wailed Madame. “All children! And so, what will they do without their old gouvernante? My poor braves, what will they do without Kishwégin? It is too dreadful, too dre-eadful, yes. The poor Mr. May—so disappointed.”
“Then let him be disappointed,” cried Alvina, as she forcibly tucked up Madame and made her lie still.
“You are hard! You are a hard Englishwoman. All alike. All alike!” Madame subsided fretfully and weakly. Alvina moved softly about. And in a few minutes Madame was sleeping again.
Alvina went downstairs. Mr. May was listening to Max, who was telling in German all about the White Prisoner scene. Mr. May had spent his boyhood in a German school. He cocked his head on one side, and, laying his hand on Max’s arm, entertained him in odd German. The others were silent. Ciccio made no pretence of listening, but smoked and stared at his own feet. Louis and Geoffrey half understood, so Louis nodded with a look of deep comprehension, whilst Geoffrey uttered short, snappy “Ja!—Ja!—Doch!—Eben!” rather irrelevant.
“I’ll be the squaw,” cried Mr. May in English, breaking off and turning round to the company. He perked up his head in an odd, parrot-like fashion. “I’ll be the squaw! What’s her name? Kishwégin? I’ll be Kishwégin.” And he bridled and beamed self-consciously.
The two tall Swiss looked down on him, faintly smiling. Ciccio, sitting with his arms on his knees on the sofa, screwed round his head and watched the phenomenon of Mr. May with inscrutable, expressionless attention.
“Let us go,” said Mr. May, bubbling with new importance. “Let us go and rehearse this morning, and let us do the procession this afternoon, when the colliers are just coming home. There! What? Isn’t that exactly the idea? Well! Will you be ready at once, now?”