Wunsch nodded.
“Was she beautiful?”
“ABER GAR NICHT! Not at all. She was ugly; big mouth, big teeth, no
figure, nothing at all,” indicating a luxuriant bosom by sweeping his
hands over his chest. “A pole, a post! But for the voice—ACH! She have
something in there, behind the eyes,” tapping his temples.
Thea followed all his gesticulations intently. “Was she German?”
“No, SPANISCH.” He looked down and frowned for a moment. ”ACH, I tell
you, she look like the Frau Tellamantez, some-thing. Long face, long
chin, and ugly al-so.”
“Did she die a long while ago?”
“Die? I think not. I never hear, anyhow. I guess she is alive somewhere
in the world; Paris, may-be. But old, of course. I hear her when I was a
youth. She is too old to sing now any more.”
“Was she the greatest singer you ever heard?”
Wunsch nodded gravely. “Quite so. She was the most—” he hunted for an
English word, lifted his hand over his head and snapped his fingers
noiselessly in the air, enunciating fiercely, “KUNST-LER-ISCH!” The word
seemed to glitter in his uplifted hand, his voice was so full of
emotion.
Wunsch rose from the stool and began to button his wadded jacket,
preparing to return to his half-heated room in the loft. Thea
regretfully put on her cloak and hood and set out for home.
When Wunsch looked for his score late that afternoon, he found that Thea
had not forgotten to take it with her. He smiled his loose, sarcastic
smile, and thoughtfully rubbed his stubbly chin with his red fingers.
When Fritz came home in the early blue twilight the snow was flying
faster, Mrs. Kohler was cooking HASENPFEFFER in the kitchen, and the
professor was seated at the piano, playing the Gluck, which he knew by
heart. Old Fritz took off his shoes quietly behind the stove and lay
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