At the same moment a young Bulgarian, smoking a thin long cigarette in the exact center of his lips, rose from a seat and followed him. When Jacobelli crossed the street, intent and purpose in every move of his rotund figure, the boy waited, his seal-brown eyes mere slits, half-lifted lids showing gleams of high lights as he stared fixedly after him. Outside the narrow flagged plots, the old teacher hesitated, then entered the dusty hallway of the house next to Ames’s abiding-place. The Bulgarian smiled and followed after him, lingering at the corner.
Up in the studio luncheon was over. So successful and opulent it had been, this brigand feast, that Dmitri announced they were all suffering from the ennui of satiety, that bête noire of the rich. Carlota was happy once more. She had read over the libretto of the operetta while the two argued over points in the score, had sat at the piano, trying bits here and there of Fiametta’s rôle until, somewhere down on Bleecker Street, a church chime reached her ears, and she rose hurriedly. Maria would be home at two.
“I must leave you,” she said regretfully. “And all the dishes to wash!”
“I’ll do them gladly.” Dmitri donned an apron promptly. “Griff, you take your inspiration to the ’bus while I do your work for you.”
“How do you know that I take the ’bus to my home?”
She looked back at him teasingly. He waved both hands comprehensively, dismissing the query as superfluous.
“Everybody who comes down here takes the ’bus. It is part of the thrill, the experience of the unusual. They are the land ferries that cross the gulf between fact and fancy.”
He began the duet plaintively as he fished for a strip of drapery and tossed it about his shoulders for a cloak. Carlota took up the reply of Mimi while she pulled a black-velvet student cap over her close, glossy ripples of hair. Out on the landing Ames waited for her eagerly.
“Listen. You will come again soon, won’t you, dear? Dmitri’s a curious sort, but he’s all gold, no alloy. He thinks your voice is great.”
“I like him very much,” she said naïvely. “Much better than Mrs. Nevins and her daughter. How many times must you go to see them this week?”