"No, there is no other reason." She put her hand on the arm of her companion and the lights suddenly became misty, for he was of an apoplectic tendency. They talked of music, of the opera in Vienna and Prague. She was born in Bavaria, not more than a day's ride from Marienbad. You could almost see her country from the top of the Podhornberg, in the direction of the Franconian Mountains, not far from Bayreuth. The place was called Schnabelwaid, and it was very high, very windy. Since her tenth year she had been singing—yes, even in the chorus at the Vienna opera, with her sister and brother. They were no common yodlers. They could sing all the music of the day. The yodling was part of their business, as was the costume. Later, when she had enough saved, she would study in Vienna for grand opera!
He was enraptured. How romantic it all was! A free-born maiden—he was certain she was reared in some old castle—wandering about earning money for her musical education. What a picture for a painter! What a story for a novelist! They were interrupted. The dancer, a young man with a heavy shock of hair growing low on his forehead, under which twinkled beady black eyes, had been sent to tell Fräulein Röselein that her colleagues were waiting for her. With a courtesy she went away. Krayne now thoroughly hated the dancer.
It was long after eleven when the concert was over and the party started on its homeward trip. Krayne and Röselein walked behind the others, and soon the darkness and the narrowness of the road forced him to tread after the girl. The moon's rays at intervals pierced the foliage, making lacelike patches of light in the gloom. At times they skirted the edges of a circular clearing and saw the high pines fringing the southern horizon; overhead the heavens were almost black, except where great streams of stars swept in irregular bands. It was a glorious sight, Krayne told Röselein—too sublime to be distracted by mere mortal love-making, he mentally added. Nevertheless he was glad when they were again in the woods; he could barely distinguish the girl ahead of him, but her outline made his heart beat faster. Once, as they neared the town, he helped her down a declivity into the roadway, and he could not help squeezing her hand. The pressure was returned. He boldly placed her arm within his, and they at last reached the streets, but not before, panting with mingled fright and emotion, he solemnly kissed her. She did not appear surprised.
"Call me Rösie—thou!" she murmured, and her naïveté brought the ready tears to his eyes. They made a rendezvous for the next morning on the Promenade Platz. The only thing he did not like was the scowling face of the dancer when he said good night to the others under the electric lights of the Kreuzbrunnen. He was correct, then, in his premonition.
That night Hugh Krayne dreamed he was a very skeleton for thinness—not an unusual vision of fat men—and also a Tyrolean yodler, displaying himself before a huge audience of gigantic human beings, who laughed so loudly that he could not open his lips to frame the familiar words of his song. In the despair of a frantic nightmare, his face streaming with anguished tears, he forced his voice:—
La, la, liriti! La, la, larita! Hallali! Then he awoke in triumph. Was he not a yodler?
III
He told her of his dream and strange ambition. She did not discourage him. It could be settled easily enough. Why not join the company and take a few lessons? "With such a teacher?" he had exclaimed, and his gesture was so impassioned that the promenaders, with their shining morning goblets of water, were arrested by the spectacle. Wonderful, wonderful Marienbad! was the general comment! But Krayne was past ridicule. He already saw Röselein his bride. He saw himself a yodler. The cure? Ay, there was the rub. He laid bare his heart. She aided him with her cool advice. She was very sensible. Her brother-in-law and her sister would welcome him in their household, for he was a lover of music and his intentions were honourable. Of course, he sighed, of course, and fingered his red tie. Why not, she argued, remain at Marienbad for three weeks more and complete his cure? Anyhow, he was not so stout! She looked up at him archly. Again he saw mist.
That settled it. For another three weeks he lived in a cloud of expectation, of severe training, long walks, dieting, and Turkish baths. No man worked harder. And he was rewarded by seeing his flesh melt away a pound or two daily. When the company returned after its itinerary in the neighbourhood Rösie was surprised to meet a man who did not weigh much over two hundred pounds, healthy, vigorous, and at least five years younger in appearance. She was very much touched. So was her sister. There was a family consultation, and despite the surly opposition of the dancer, Hugh Krayne was welcomed as a member of the Präger Bavarian Sextette company. Forgetting the future he had arranged for Rösie, he began his vocal lessons immediately.
In July he sang for the first time in public at Eger. He was extremely frightened, but as it was only a duo he managed fairly well. Then he sang at Tepl, this time alone. His voice broke badly in the yodel and he was jeered by a rude audience. He had grown very much thinner. His doctor warned him against continuing the waters, and advised rice, potatoes, and ale, but he did not listen. He now paid the bills of the company while travelling. Rösie had confessed with tears that they were fearfully poor. From that time he handed her his purse. He even placated the jealous dancer with a gold watch and a box of hair pomade. Ah! how he loathed the fellow's curly locks, his greasy familiarities! Rösie told him this acrobat was necessary in the company until he could be replaced. Already Hugh—she called him "Ü"—could yodel better. Some day he might, when thinner, dance better. Perhaps—again that appealing glance, the corner of her lips faintly touched by the mysterious smile of a Monna Lisa. Krayne redoubled his arduous training, practised yodling in the forests, danced jigs on the pine-needles, and doubled his allowance of the waters.