"Very un-American," remarked the singer, as he ate his crab bisque.
"How many American houses have you been in?" irritably asked Calcraft. Viznina admitted that he was enjoying his début.
"I thought so." Calcraft was now as bland as a May morning, and his eyes sparkled. His wife watched Magda serve the fish and fowl, and her husband insisted upon champagne as the sole wine. The tenor looked surprised, and then amused.
"Americans love champagne, do they not? I never touch it."
"Would you rather have claret or beer?" hastily inquired the host.
"Neither; I must sing Tristan to-morrow."
"You singers are saints on the stage." The critic laughed. "I am old-fashioned enough to believe that good wine or beer will never hurt the throat. Now there was Karl Formes, and Niemann the great tenor—"
Tekla interrupted. "My dear Cal, pray don't get on one of your interminable liquid talks. Herr Viznina does not care to drink, whether he is singing or not. I told him, too, that we always liked a guest at dinner, for we are such old married people."
Calcraft watched the pair facing one another. He was in a disagreeable humor because of his wife's allusion to visitors; he liked to bear the major burden of conversation, even when they were alone. If Tekla began he had to sit still and drink—there was no other alternative. She asked Viznina where he was born, where he had studied, and why he had changed his name. The answers were those of a man in love with his art. Hinweg, he explained, was his mother's name, and assumed because of the anti-Slav prejudice existing in Vienna.
Calcraft broke in. "You say you are Bohemian, Herr Viznina? You are really as Swedish looking as Mrs. Calcraft."