Parisian wit and
fashion: the great Flaubert, a noisy fellow at times, I vow; Dumas
_fils_; Cabanel, Gerome, Duran; ever-winning Carolus--ah, what men! Now
we get Polish pianists, crazy Belgians, anarchistic poets, and
Neo-impressionists. I have warned the princess again and again."

"_Becasse!_" interrupted the lady herself. "Monsieur Rajewski has
consented to play a Chopin nocturne. And here are my two painters, Miss
Adams--Messieurs Bla and Maugre. They hate each other like the Jesuits
and Jansenists of the good old days of Pascal."

"She likes to display her learning," grumbled the marquis to Mrs.
Sheldam. "That younger man, Bla, swears by divided tones; his neighbour,
Maugre, paints in dots. One is always to be recognized a half-mile away
by his vibrating waterscapes--he calls them Symphonies of the Wet; the
other goes in for turkeys in the grass, fowls that are cobalt-blue
daubs, with grass a scarlet. It's awful on the optic nerves.
_Pointillisme_, Maugre names his stuff. Now, give me Corot--"

"Hush, hush!" came in energetic sibilants from the princess, who rapped
with her Japanese walking-stick for silence. Mr. Sheldam woke up and
fumbled the pictures as Rajewski, slowly bending his gold-dust aureole
until it almost grazed the keyboard, began with deliberate accents a
nocturne. Miss Adams knew his playing well, but its poetry was not for
her this evening; rather did the veiled tones of the instrument form a
misty background to the human tableau. So must Chopin have woven his
magic last century, and in a salon like this--the wax candles burning
with majestic steadiness in the sculptured sconces; the huge fireplace,
monumental in design, with its dull brass garnishing; the subdued
richness of the decoration into which fitted, as figures in a frame, the
various guests. Even the waxed floor seemed to take on new
reverberations as the pianoforte sounded the sweet despair of the Pole.
To her dismay Ermentrude caught herself drifting away from the moment's
hazy charm to thoughts of her poet. It annoyed her, she sharply
reminded herself, that she could not absolutely saturate herself with
the music and the manifold souvenirs of the old hotel; perhaps this may
have been the spell of Rajewski's playing....

The music ceased. A dry voice whispered in her ear:--

"Great artist, that chap Rajewski. Had to leave Russia once because he
wouldn't play the Russian national hymn for the Czar. Bless me, but he
was almost sent