She was no practised dancer, none of our conventional ballerinas, whose perfect flexibility destroys all individual charm; her limbs had not been disfigured by year-long torture; they possessed neither the pitiful thinness nor the dazzling rapidity of a race-horse. She did not know how to execute with the lower extremities the most ambitious figures, while--as is considered essential--the upper body remained stiff; she did no gymnastics--she danced! And not only with her limbs--she danced with her whole body.
Oh, what an intoxicating bending and swaying! A proud drawing up of the body, and caressing sinking backward! Her dancing had nothing animated, challenging about it, but something subtly alluring, almost magically seductive. Her whole appearance suggested longing weariness, as when in a storm the flowers shudderingly bend their heads earthward. And she was beautiful! The short oval of her face, the low brow, the short, straight nose, the delicate, quivering nostrils, the high cheek-bones, the slightly sunken cheeks, the long, deep-set eyes, full of loving dreaminess and passion, the full, curved lips, turning upward with an expression of languishing weariness--all this reminded one not in the least of the ideal, gentle brunette Madonnas of Murillo. It reminded one of nothing holy, nothing classical--but it was the most seductive earthly beauty which one could imagine!
The audience raved; the officers screamed themselves hoarse with "Brava! Brava!" Some of them made poor jokes about the dancer, others hummed or whistled reminiscences of the Spanish music. Only Felix was silent. "You act like one to whom a ghost has announced death," jested Prince Hugo B----, and thereupon proposed that the officers should go upon the stage in a body and give Juanita an ovation.
How he remembers all that to-day! The large half-lighted room near the stage, the dusty old rafters, the ropes, the torn scenes, the dim gas-lights, the crowd of actors and actresses huddled together, the trapeze artist who wore a brown waterproof over his pink doublet and green tights, and in the midst of this unsavory crowd--Juanita. In a shabby gray dress, and green and blue checked shawl, she stood near an elderly very shabby woman, and smiled with her languishing lips most indifferently, while the men vied with each other in paying her the most effusive compliments in imaginary Spanish or bad French. When they withdrew Felix stumbled over something. It was the yellow flower which Juanita had worn in her hair, dusty, withered, trodden upon. Carefully he wiped the dust from it, and tried to revive the faded, crumpled petals.
"Deuce take it! We should invite her to supper," cried Prince B----, suddenly standing still.
"Why, Hugo?" stammered Felix.
The former laughed, turned on his heel, gave his invitation, and Juanita nodded perfectly contentedly. She had no objection to sup with the gentlemen. To be sure, she took her theatre mother with her.
How Felix recalled all this!
The glaring gas-light in the long narrow room of the restaurant; the sleepy, blinking waiter; Manuela--that was the name of the dancer's protecting angel--who, without removing hat or wrap, and also without saying a word, with the usual appetite of all theatre mothers, bent over her plate; the officers who, with faces flushed with wine, proposed clumsy toasts, and Juanita who, seated beside the Prince upon a red divan, again and again rubbed her large weary eyes with her little hands, like a sleepy child.
She ate without affectation and without greediness--only sipped the champagne, smiled good-naturedly at the boldest jokes, whether she understood them not, with the resignation of a being who was accustomed to earn her bread in this manner.