o smoke a fat black seegar and wear a silk
hat when you ride in one of these! I feel like a parade." He was like a
boy on a holiday, as always when in Europe.

"But let me tell you about this girl, won't you!"

"Oh, it's a girl! What's her name? What's she do?"

"Her name's Mizzi."

"Mizzi what?"

"I don't know. She's a hod carrier. She--"

"That's all right, Wallie. I'm here now. An ice bag on your head and
real quiet for two-three days. You'll come round fine."

But Wallie was almost sulking. "Wait till you see her, S.H. She sings."

"Beautiful, is she?"

"No, not particularly. No."

"Wonderful voice, h'm?"

"N-n-no. I wouldn't say it was what you'd call exactly wonderful."

Sid Hahn stood up in the droshky and waved his short arms in windmill
circles. "Well, what the devil does she do then, that's so good? Carry
bricks!"

"She is good at that. When she balances that pail of mortar on her head
and walks off with it, her arms hanging straight at her sides--"

But Sid Hahn's patience was at an end. "You're a humourist, you are. If
I didn't know you I'd say you were drunk. I'll bet you are, anyway.
You've been eating paprika, raw. You make me sick."

Inelegant, but expressive of his feelings. But Wallie only said, "You
wait. You'll see."

Sid Hahn did see. He saw next day. Wallie woke him out of a sound sleep
so that he might see. It was ten-thirty A.M. so that his peevishness was
unwarranted. They had seen the play the night before and Hahn had
decided that, translated and with interpolations (it was a comic opera),
it would captivate New York. Then and there he completed the
negotiations which Wallie had begun. Hahn was all for taking the first
train out, but Wallie was firm. "You've got to see her, I tell you.
You've got to see her."

Their hotel faced the Corso. The Corso is a wide promenade that runs
along the Buda bank of the Danube. Across the river, on the hill, the
royal palace looks down upon the little common people. In that day the
monde and the demi-monde of Budapest walked on the Corso between twelve
and one. Up and down. Up and down. The women, tall, dark, flashing-eyed,
daringly dressed. The men sallow, meagre, and wearing those trousers
which, cut very wide and flappy at the ankles, make them the dowdiest
men in the world. Hahn's room and Wallie's were on the second floor of
the hotel, and at a corner. One set of windows faced the Corso, the
river, and Pest on the hill. The other se