Alfred Stone reflected: She is unusual. Never mind her beauty or her voice; it's her personality that will win out. What curious eyes. Hard as steel when she doesn't like the way things are going. Big heart? Yes—for herself. A cold hard-boiled egg is that same heart. Temperament! Well, I don't know. She may be as hot as a red-hot stove, but she is cerebral all the same. Never will waste herself in the swamp of sensual sentimentality. She will learn to use a man just as a man uses a woman. Un, deux, trois—c'est fini! That's the only way. Like trying on a new pair of gloves. Do they fit? No. Chuck 'em away. I think Frida Ash is the right card for her, not Fursch. Easter is not ready yet for the footlights.
He walked into the vestibule of the Maison Felicé and to his surprise found her waiting for him.
"What! Punctuality in a future prima-donna," he jested. Easter disliked him this afternoon. She was in an umbrageous humour. She had slept soundly, the day was clear, the air crisp, the snow was not ankle-deep. Why had she turned cold? She didn't know. Stone suddenly bored her. Yet she had passed the morning thinking of him. Why his sudden interest? Would he try to profit by her? Such things she had read about in musical journals. Managers—who didn't advertise—were denounced by unselfish editors. Perhaps he would make a commission by taking her to the Cosmopolitaine. Nasty mean suspicions closed in upon her. She couldn't shake them off. She sang some scales; she read without interest a morning newspaper that she had found in the rusty drawing-room. The French breakfast of chocolate and rolls didn't appeal to her. She possessed a young, healthy appetite; and she missed the cozy chatter of the American breakfast-table. Several times she peeped through the glass door of her apartment, but saw no one. Various noises told her that the household was cleaning. In despair she took a warm bath and admired the rickety old tub, sheet-iron, not porcelain. She admired her body's lithe length as she faced an oval mirror. I am nice, she thought. Smooth, white, not hairy like so many girls I know. Her breasts were sketchy, but her bosom was so massive that a rich harvest was certain. Her pelvic curve was classic, her legs long and not knock-kneed. The Lord be praised for that much! she said aloud. It was her hair that most pleased her. Black with a suggestion of blue it was like a helmet on her small head. Its tone was faintly echoed in the arm-pits and on the tâche d'encre, as they say in the painter's atelier. A robust girl and a desirable one, though the languorous, voluptuous air was absent. Easter might be profoundly immoral, but never a slimy odalisque. Her temperament was too tonic. Passion—yes, to the edge of tatters. Foaming passion; but no man would ever call her slave. This she resolved, as she squeezed her tiny breasts. Then she bowed low to her image, kicked her right leg on high, turned her comely back, peeped over her shoulder, mockingly stuck out her tongue as she regarded with awe—almost—the width of her delicately modelled buttocks. "Good heavens!" she exclaimed. "I hope I'm not going to get a married woman's bottom like Amy Brown's." Then she slowly dressed, after much pagan joy over her physical beauty.
She ate everything they brought her at the luncheon table. "Starved, that's what I am. Nothing since last night." She was glad to be alone at table. She wished to think over the situation. Her money wouldn't last long. What then! Not for a moment did she consider the possibility of a complaisant rich man. She knew her value in that direction; always, or nearly always, having a man messing about you! No, she preferred her liberty, the most precious liberty of sleeping solo, of arising in the morning alone. She swallowed her demi-tasse and found Stone at the door.
"Let's walk to Union Square," he said and she assented. They went across to Broadway. He quietly studied his companion, who, in the liveliest spirits, hummed, chattered, flirted with every good-looking man she passed, and elbowed her companion into a state of irritation. He was a stickler for the nuances of behaviour, especially in women. He, the Bohemian, frequenter of race-courses, gambling hells, cafés, cocottes and even worse, couldn't tolerate a slang phrase from the mouth of a woman. He saw that Easter was crude, though not coarse. Her education had been the normal unintelligent education of small towns. She hadn't been taught to talk, walk or dress properly. Nevertheless, she wasn't slouchy, and her bearing distinctive. She was Esther Brandès, and six months hence she would be a full-fledged New York woman. Of that he was assured. Perhaps sooner. And men? She liked them, he saw that. Had she? Who could tell? She wasn't shy. She hadn't thus far blushed. To be sure, the conversation hadn't strayed from the conventional. Then he laughed. She turned to him.
"Let me laugh, too," she begged. "I was thinking," he explained, "of an old maid aunt of mine who used to pray the Lord she wouldn't die guessing." Easter stopped and unrestrainedly roared. He was scandalized. "Hurry up," he expostulated. "We shall be late, otherwise." But he was secretly elated at the quick-fire success of his joke. A smart girl, that; she will go far—perhaps too far. They went into the Conservatoire Cosmopolitaine. The door was opened by a polite coloured man. He said Madame was busy just then. Wouldn't they wait in the reception room? Stone called the old man "George" and gave him a cigarette. The room was on the first floor facing the entrance hall. At the stroke of four gabble was heard. Girls and young men with fiddle cases and music-rolls tumbled down stairs, while fresh classes were forming. A weary or bored instructor bustled among his pupils. A gong struck. "Now, ladies, now gentlemen," called out George. "Upstairs, please, for Monsieur Lapoul's class."
"It's run like a railway station here," said Stone. Then added in French, "We shall see Madame Mayerbeer first, but don't say anything about Fursch-Madi. I'd like to get you on the free-list, then, perhaps, you might help out by accompanying." Easter tried to look grateful, but couldn't. "What do they pay accompanists by the hour?" she naively inquired.
"Pon my word," he answered, "you are a regular pawnbroker."
"Oh, it's all very well for you. You're a man. I must work for my living." She was tart. He grimly smiled: "A critic who has to listen to rotten singers isn't working, is he? Hello! here's Madame." A pretty plump little woman, picturesquely garbed in brown-ribbed velvet, wearing a man's collar and cravat artistically tied, tripped into the room and in French bade them the time of day. Stone took her apart and whispered in her little ear, which her loosely piled iron gray hair did not conceal. But she was all eyes for the girl, who in turn devoured this model Parisienne. And she is an American, what chic! thought Easter. "A voice, you say, Alfred, and such good looks. I should say so. Come up stairs, Miss Brandès. Nice stage name, eh, Alfred! Of course, she will go into the Fursch class." "I don't know about that," answered Stone, who seemed to be an oracle in the eyes of Madame. "I should rather say Ash. The young lady has a lot to learn, a long road to travel—" "Yes, but"—"But me no buts," he retorted. "With Fursch-Madi she will only get a vocal top-dressing, whereas it's the roots that need attending to. No, try Frida Ash."
"Bien, monsieur, mais vous êtes exigeant." Madame Mayerbeer turned to the girl and fairly glowed with enthusiasm.