CHAPTER VII

Marie began to sing only for one table, for the one pair of ears for whose appreciation she cared. Love had not entered her thoughts, only a deep interest. This man was so unlike the others who frequented the "Two Eagles." His stern face that could break into a smile for her, the lines about his thin mouth, the graying hair, his straight military shoulders, all meant to the girl the protection she might have had from her father. She would have laughed had she known the thoughts that were worrying the good people with whom she lived.

The fact, however, that some one was interested in her, brought more color into her cheeks, more vivacity into her manner. She was developing, the lines of her figure were rounder. She was more mature. The promise of fair young womanhood was beginning to be fulfilled, so that now as she hurried along the short aisle between her dressing-room and the platform, more eyes followed her, more hands were stretched out to detain her. Brower was pleased with his investment.

One night she left the platform earlier than usual. The Captain and his companion had already gone, and she whispered to old Schultz that she would wait for him in her dressing-room. Once in the shelter of its dirty walls, she pinned on her hat, threw her cloak about her and sat down till the old man should be ready to come for her. She leaned her elbows on the board which served as a dressing-table and looked at herself in the square of looking-glass that hung above it. It was cracked and splotched with mildew, and the light of the one gas jet flickered and marked queer shadows under her eyes and chin. But even so, she smiled at the pleasing image that smiled back at her.

The opening of the door startled her, and turning, she found herself facing Brower. The proprietor of the "Two Eagles" had never entered the little room before. Her heart sank. Was he coming to tell her she was not needed?

"What----" she began, but Brower stopped her.

"Don't get frightened, _Kleine_. I didn't come to tell you I thought I could get along without you." His voice was thick, and his coarse face redder than usual. He leered at her with his small, swinish eyes. She saw that he had been drinking heavily. "You're looking prettier these days, and I think I'll stretch a point and let you have an extra krone if you want it. Now, who says I'm not kind-hearted, eh? Come, little one, give me a kiss!" and before the girl quite realized what he was doing, he had grabbed her by the shoulders and planted a rough kiss on her cheek.

Marie screamed and pushed him from her with all her force.

"How dare you?" she gasped. "How dare you?"

Brower chuckled. "You're prettier when you're mad! Gott! I think I'll have another!" but as he started toward her, the girl struck him full in the face with her little clenched fist and ran from the room.

The indignity of it, the horrible feel of his flabby lips against her cheek, made her shudder as at the touch of some loathsome reptile. She ran sobbing through the passage, but just as she was about to open the door and go out into the street, a hand was laid on her arm.

She shrank back, shivering into the shadow, but as she turned, she found herself face to face with the Captain.

"Fräulein," he said, "what is wrong?"

Marie hid her face against his coat sleeve as a child might have done.

"He kissed me," she sobbed, "the awful creature!"

"Who?" his low voice shook with rage.

"Brower! I was waiting for Schultz to take me home, he came into the room and kissed me! It was horrible!"

Von Pfaffen started down the passage.

"I'll settle with him," he raged, but Marie caught at his hand.

"Please," she whispered frightened, "please!" and he turned and patted her shoulder.

"Very well," he said, "I'll see him later. Come, let me take you home," and with gentle fingers, he fastened her coat collar about her throat, and before Marie realized it, he had swept her into a _fiakre_ and they were whirling away.

The thought of this man's kindness to her overwhelmed her again, and she huddled into her corner crying as though her heart would break.

"Come, Fräulein," urged her companion, "you really mustn't. I'll see that the brute is punished. You mustn't cry so," and he put a protecting arm about her shoulders.

Marie sobbed against the rough cloth of his heavy military coat. All the sorrow and struggle, all the misery of the past months seemed to pour from her heart, but presently, mingled with the rumble of the wheels, she seemed to hear the query, "where are you going?"

She straightened herself suddenly and her companion made no effort to detain her.

"You haven't even asked me where I live," she said, surprise quieting her sobs. "Where are you taking me?"

Von Pfaffen drew her against his shoulder again.

"I knew you would tell me when you were calmer," he said. "In the meantime, it is early; we're here at my place. Come in for a minute. You are frightened and nervous. Come in, my old housekeeper will make you a cup of coffee, and by the time old Schultz reaches home, you'll be there too."

"Oh no," began Marie, "Frau Schultz will be worried, I can't," but the brakes were already jerking against the wheels and in another second the _fiakre_ had drawn up in front of a brown-stone apartment house.

"I can't, they'll worry," and Marie drew back in the shelter of the cab as Von Pfaffen stepped onto the sidewalk and held out his hand to help her alight.

"Nonsense," he assured her, "I'll telephone the 'Two Eagles' as soon as we get in and have them tell Schultz. Come, Fräulein, just a cup of coffee."

His arm steadied her across the icy pavement, and the warmth of the apartment hall was comforting, but Marie stepped into the lift with a beating heart.

Was this wrong, she asked herself? Would her father have approved? But the wonder of it all soon dulled the still small voice that spoke again of that vague sense of danger, and she entered the hallway as Von Pfaffen stood aside before the door he had just opened.

The girl looked about her curiously. So this was where he lived. It was a comfortable apartment, a peculiar mixture of severity and luxury. The great easy chair that held out inviting arms before a bright fire burning in the great _kachelofen_, and the long bare table with its litter of official-looking papers, contrasted curiously.

Von Pfaffen rang the bell and an old woman came in. Marie instinctively disliked her face, with its pendulous nose and the heavy blue-veined cheeks, but she seemed kindly and the girl was ashamed of her aversion.

"Coffee, Lena," ordered the Captain, and with a peculiar flat-footed shuffle, the old woman turned and left the room.

"She was my nurse when I was a child," said Von Pfaffen, and Marie looked after the ungainly form with a new interest.

"I--I'm ashamed to be giving you all this trouble," she stammered, as he helped her out of her coat; "but I couldn't stay there, could I?"

"Indeed you couldn't, child. Now you must forget all about it. I'm glad it was I who chanced to find you before that beast could do you further harm. To-morrow I shall crush him like a fly!"

"You and the Schultzes are all the friends I have." She looked up at him gratefully. "There isn't anyone else in all the world."

Von Pfaffen took the little hand and patted it.

"There, there," he smiled, "three friends are a great many to have in this world, don't you think?" and he settled her comfortably into one of the big arm-chairs before the fire.

After a little, Lena waddled in, preceded by an appetizing aroma of coffee. She carried a tray on which she had set out a shining urn and a dish of cakes, and pushing aside the scattered papers on the littered table, she made room for her burden.

"Is everything well, Lena?" asked her master.

The old woman grunted and shuffled out, closing the door after her.

"She's not very friendly," apologized Von Pfaffen, "but she takes advantage of having been with me nearly all my life, and besides, she lends an air of respectability to my bachelor establishment."

Marie smiled because he did. It was good to be here in this handsomely furnished apartment, warm and cozy, and with this man, whom she so much admired, beside her. She sipped her coffee luxuriantly and nibbled one of the little cakes.

"I'll telephone that you're safe with me, Fräulein," he said, and rose and left the room.

Marie looked about her. How wonderful Fate was, she mused. If it hadn't been for that horrible Brower, she would not have been here now. The unwonted warmth lulled her. The love of comfort and luxury was strong in her. Her father had catered to it. It had been his happiness to see how readily she had given up the austerity of the convent and revelled in the almost sybaritic ease with which he loved to surround her. She snuggled down into the embrace of the great easy chair with a sigh of content.

This was what her home had been like that short year with her father, and the thought of that and the intervening months with their bitter struggle, sent the slow tears down her cheeks again. She had not time to brush them away when her host entered.

"It's all right, Fräulein," he said. "Schultz came to the phone himself. I told him I'd bring you home later. What? You're not crying again? Fräulein, I call that unkind, when I'm trying to do all I can for you."

"I know you are," there was a catch in Marie's voice. "I'm not going to cry any more."

"That's right," and Von Pfaffen drew his chair up beside her.

"Now, let's have a talk. I've wanted to, ever since I first saw you at the 'Two Eagles.'"

"How wonderful that you should even have noticed me!" Marie was unconscious of any coquetry. It was wonderful to hear that this resplendent being should have picked her out for notice.

The Captain leaned over and took one of her hands in his.

"What a pretty little hand," he said. "What a pity it has had to work so hard. All these rough places," and suddenly he raised her fingers to his lips.

Marie was startled, but at her involuntary movement, he dropped her hand and turned again to the fire.

"Warm enough here?" he asked, so paternally, that the girl was ashamed of her vague fears. But somewhere in the distance she heard a clock striking the hour.

"It must be getting late, Herr Captain," she faltered, "I think I'd better go," and with a half sigh for the comfort about her, she rose to her feet.

The man rose, too, hastily, and put his hands on her shoulders.

"Just a little longer, Fräulein," he begged, "I've thought so often of you sitting here as you are now."

His face frightened Marie. The warmth of his hands burning through the shoulders of her thin gown made her uneasy. His eyes seemed bloodshot in the firelight, and a vein in his forehead suddenly stood out like a cord.

"Herr Captain, let me go," whispered the girl. "I must go."

"No!" His voice shook, "no, little one, you're here and you're mine," and before she really knew what was happening, she found herself crushed against his breast, powerless to struggle, a great dizziness sweeping over her. She seemed to lose all sense of everything excepting that from somewhere immeasurably above her, his mouth drew nearer, and nearer, till it folded over her own in a stifling kiss.

After what seemed an interminable time, consciousness came back to her, power to struggle, and with the strength of youth, she freed herself from his arms.

"Let me go," she panted, "let me go," and blindly she flung herself against the door that stood behind her. Where it led, she did not know, she only knew that she must get away, away from this man as she had run away from the other.

Slipping into the room beyond, she threw herself against the door, striving with desperate force to hold it against the man on the other side. She had only time to realize that she had flung herself into his bedroom for shelter, when the door yielded, and she cowered into a corner.

Von Pfaffen came toward her, his voice thick and unsteady. The vein in his forehead beating, his eyes, even away from the firelight, were bloodshot.

"Little one," he whispered, "you're not going to shut me out--to-night!"