The Street of Seven Stars

ouse was war

er the beards of middle life the fine horizontal scars of student days; elderly doctors from the general hospital across the street; even a Hofrath or two, drinking beer and reading the "Fliegende Blaetter" and "Simplicissimus"; and in an alcove round a billiard table a group of noisy Korps students. Over all a permea

spite of the salon of Maria Theresa and three expensive lessons a week in German. Harmony knew the art galleries and the churches, which w

andsome, hardly good-looking. His mouth was wide, his nose irregular, his hair a nondescript brown,-but the mouth had humor, the nose character, and, thank Heaven, there was plenty of hair. Not that Harmony saw all this at once.

the contrast. Possibly the revelation was an easement to the girl's nervousness. This smiling and unpressed individual, blithely waving aloft the Paris edition of the "Heral

sat down at her side, not to interf

r?" he

y mu

I live. They save the sugariest cakes for me. Don't let me bother you; go on and read. See which o

round. It's cur

e coffee-house, one dozen military men for local color, one dozen students ditto, and one

out the medi

dark-gray eyes fulfilled the

public will eat cinnamon cakes and drink coffee until the feeble American

conversation until she had had her coffee. She ate the ca

prescribing, and there's to be no conversation until the

loud, as she ate, bits of news from the paper, pausing to sip his own coffee and to cast an eye over the crowded room. Here and there an officer, gazing with too open a

l began to gather up her wra

ed gravely, "is twofold. Coffee is only the

rse very

t ourselves. We are sure to do

at her back; better than the little room with the sagging bed and the doors covered with wall paper. Her feet had stopped aching, too, She could have sat there

," she

hat over early, because it isn't much, as n

I'm not s

her's. Augustus! It's rather a mess. What shall I put on my professional brassplate? I

Patr

ss as Patrick! Patrick has possibilities. The d

confessed half shyly, "

e West and escaped unmarried; did two years in a drygoods store until, by saving and working in my vacations, I got through medical college and tried general practice. Didn't like it-always wanted to do surgery. A little legacy from the German uncle, trying to atone for the 'Augustus,' gave

esponse in her-loneliness and struggle, and the ever-present anxiety about money, grim determination, hope and fear, and even occasional despair. He was still young, bu

d out h

I understand very well because-it's music with me: v

table and looked out over

never pan out! Why aren't you at home to-night, eating a civilized beefsteak and running upstairs to get ready for a nice young man to bring you a box of chocolates? Wh

o expect none. She was drawing on her gloves

. Then, seeing Byrne, he waved a greeting to him. Byr

eyes. Unlike Byrne, he was foppishly neat. He was not alone. A slim little Austr

e demanded fretfully in Ge

y had, and eminently satisfactory, each underst

smoking a great many poisonous and highly expen

his eyes and sti

that wit

d out, little one. Old Pe

icer as she passed him, and paused to apologize, to the officer's delight and her escort's irritation. And Pete

he table while he was still greeting her. He held her in conversation in his absurd German until they had reached the swinging doors, while her companion followed helplessly. And he bo

e pavement when Byrne turned,

w, Stewart," he said, g

wouldn't

t argue a

s awkward pause

"That is up to you, of course. I didn't

gement rose in Byrne, but the situation f

"I have a lecture and I ma

e moved off into the night,

r and slipped a hand through her arm. "He protects h

e," he said cheerfully, "you w

the curb and r

d what

he stars, only-

oom for subtlety. The "beautiful" calmed her, but t

? What

nking of W

l for war. Stewart r

nnese idioms and German epithets. He drew his chin into the up-turned collar of his overcoat and waited, an absurdly patient figure, until the hail of consonants had subsid

ituation. He had suspected it that morning, listening to the delicatessen-seller's narrative of Rosa's account of the disrupted colony across in the old lodge; he had been certain of it that evening, finding Harmony in the dark entrance to his own rather sordid pension.

of native wine. And he knew the musical temperament; the all or nothing of its insistent demands; its heights that are higher than others, its wretchednesses that are hell. Once in the Hofstadt Theater, where he had bought stand

liards and Munchener beer, than Peter's new resolution that night: this poverty adopting

knew her name, Rosa having called her "The Beautiful One" in her nar

guardian, squared his shoulders and tried to look much older than he really was, and resp

nce at his determinedly altruistic profile. "I must

aven't even tol

resent you to-night,

yrne ro

u should not go through that

w do you

, and which proved to be in an alarming state of dissolution. It took a momen

the girl's eyes seemed somehow to compel: "That's true, but it's not all the truth. I was on the bus last night, and when you g

his suggestion that he see her safely to the old lodge and help her carry her hand-luggage and her violin to the pe

She was cleaning down the stairs by the light of a candle, and the steam of the hot water on the cold marble invested her like an aura. She stood aside to l

demanded from the doorwa

S

money you refuse, because she reminds you of you

eautiful-there is always a man,"

ng hands on her apron and

e threw back over her shoulder. "I knew it from the first;

a stiff chair under the great chandelier Peter Byrne sat and waited and blew on his