Short Fiction

nothing there to offend anyone. Girls dance and men smoke, and there is eating and drinking, and everybody is as well behaved as though there was a protecting phalanx of dowagers sitting round the walls of the saloon. There are no dowagers, though there may probably be a policeman somewhere about the place. To a stranger it is very remarkable that there is so little of what we call flirting;⁠—almost none of it. It would seem that to the girls dancing is so much a matter of business, that here at Sperl’s they can think of nothing else. To mind their steps, and at the same time their dresses, lest they should be trod upon, to keep full pace with the music, to make all the proper turns at every proper time, and to have the foot fall on the floor at the exact instant; all this is enough, without further excitement. You will see a girl dancing with a man as though the man were a chair, or a stick, or some necessary piece of furniture. She condescends to use his services, but as soon as the dance is over she sends him away. She hardly speaks a word to him, if a word! She has come there to dance, and not to talk; unless, indeed, like Marie Weber and Lotta Schmidt, she has a recognised lover there of her very own.

At about half-past ten Marie and Lotta entered the saloon, and paid their kreutzers and sat themselves down on seats in the further saloon, from which through open archways they could see the dancers. Neither Carl nor Fritz had come as yet, and the girls were quite content to wait. It was to be presumed that they would be there before the men, and they both understood that the real dancing was not commenced early in the evening. It might be all very well for such as Adela Bruhl to dance with anyone who came at ten o’clock, but Lotta Schmidt would not care to amuse herself after that fashion. As to Marie, she was to be married after another week, and of course she would dance with no one but Carl Stobel.

“Look at her,” said Lotta, pointing with her foot to a fair girl, very pretty, but with hair somewhat untidy, who at this moment was waltzing in the other room. “That lad is a waiter from the Minden hotel. I know him. She would dance with anyone.”

“I suppose she likes dancing, and there is no harm in the boy,” said Marie.

“No, there is no harm, and if she likes it I do not begrudge it her. See what red hands she has.”

“She is of that complexion,” said Marie.

“Yes, she is of that complexion all over; look at her face. At any rate she might have better shoes on. Did you ever see anybody so untidy?”

“She is very pretty,” said Marie.

“Yes, she is pretty. There is no doubt she is pretty. She is not a native here. Her people are from Munich. Do you know, Marie, I think girls are always thought more of in other countries than in their own.”

Soon after this Carl and Fritz came in together, and Fritz, as he passed across the end of the first saloon, spoke a word or two to Adela. Lotta saw this, but determined that she would take no offence at so small a matter. Fritz need not have stopped to speak, but his doing so might be all very well. At any rate, if she did quarrel with him she would quarrel on a plain, intelligible ground. Within two minutes Carl and Marie were dancing, and Fritz had asked Lotta to stand up. “I will wait a little,” said she, “I never like to begin much before eleven.”

“As you please,” said Fritz; and he sat down in the chair which Marie had occupied. Then he played with his cane, and as he did so his eyes followed the steps of Adela Bruhl.

“She dances very well,” said Lotta.

“H⁠—m⁠—m, yes.” Fritz did not choose to bestow any strong praise on Adela’s dancing.

“Yes, Fritz, she does dance well⁠—very well, indeed. And she is never tired. If you ask me whether I like her style, I cannot quite say that I do. It is not what we do here⁠—not exactly.”

“She has lived in Vienna since she was a child.”

“It is in the blood then, I suppose. Look at her fair hair, all blowing about. She is not like one of us.”

“Oh no, she is not.”

“That she is very pretty, I quite admit,” said Lotta. “Those soft gray eyes are delicious. Is it not a pity she has no eyebrows?”

“But she has eyebrows.”

“Ah! you have been closer than I, and you have seen them. I have never danced with her, and I cannot see them. Of course they are there⁠—more or less.”

After a while the dancing ceased, and Adela Bruhl came up into the supper-room, passing the seats on which Fritz and Lotta were sitting.

“Are you not going to dance, Fritz?” she said, with a smile, as she passed them.

“Go, go,” said Lotta; “why do you not go? She has invited you.”

“No; she has not invited me. She spoke to us both.”

“She did not speak to me, for my name is not Fritz. I do not see how you can help going, when she asked you so prettily.”

“I shall be in plenty of time presently. Will you dance now, Lotta? They are going to begin a waltz, and we will have a quadrille afterwards.”

“No, Herr Planken, I will not dance just now.”

“Herr Planken, is it? You want to quarrel with me then, Lotta.”

“I do not want to be one of two. I will not be one of two. Adela Bruhl is very pretty, and I advise you to go to her. I was told only yesterday her father can give her fifteen hundred florins of fortune! For me⁠—I have no father.”

“But you may have a husband tomorrow.”

“Yes, that is true, and a