We were twenty minutes late—naturally. All the people in the place stare at us and whisper about us, partly because we have a conspicuous place—the proscenium loge to the right of the stage, partly because we are in full toilet—an almost unprecedented circumstance in that homely theater—partly, I suppose, because Adelaide is supremely beautiful.
Mr. Arkwright was already with us. Von Francius joined us after the first act, and remained until the end. Almost the only words he exchanged with Adelaide were:
“Have you seen this opera before, Lady Le Marchant?”
“No; never.”
It was Auber’s merry little opera, “Des Teufels Antheil.” The play was played. Von Francius was beside me. Whenever I looked down I saw Eugen, with the same calm, placid indifference upon his face; and again I felt the old sensation of soreness, shame, and humiliation. I feel wrought up to a great pitch of nervous excitement when we leave the theater and drive to the Malkasten, where there is more music—dance music, and where the ball is at its height. And in a few moments I find myself whirling down the room in the arms of von Francius, to the music of “Mein schönster Tag in Baden,” and wishing very earnestly that the heart-sickness I feel would make me ill or faint, or anything that would send me home to quietness and—him. But it does not have the desired effect. I am in a fever; I am all too vividly conscious, and people tell me how well I am looking, and that rosy cheeks become me better than pale ones.
They are merry parties, these dances at the Malkasten, in the quaintly decorated saal of the artists’ club-house. There is a certain license in the dress. Velvet coats, and coats, too, in many colors, green and prune and claret, vying with black, are not tabooed. There are various uniforms of hussars, infantry, and uhlans, and some of the women, too, are dressed in a certain fantastically picturesque style to please their artist brothers or fiancés.
The dancing gets faster, and the festivities are kept up late. Songs are sung which perhaps would not be heard in a quiet drawing-room; a little acting is done with them. Music is played, and von Francius, in a vagrant mood, sits down and improvises a fitful, stormy kind of fantasia, which in itself and in his playing puts me much in mind of the weird performances of the Abbate Liszt.
I at least hear another note than of yore, another touch. The soul that it wanted seems gradually creeping into it. He tells a strange story upon the quivering keys—it is becoming tragic, sad, pathetic. He says hastily to me and in an under-tone: “Fräulein May, this is a thought of one of your own poets:
“‘How sad, and mad, and bad it was,
And yet how it was sweet.’”
I am almost in tears, and every face is affording illustrations for “The Expressions of the Emotions in Men and Women,” when it suddenly breaks off with a loud, Ha! ha! ha! which sounds as if it came from a human voice, and jars upon me, and then he breaks into a waltz, pushing the astonished musicians aside, and telling the company to dance while he pipes.