them all, he needed no forcing. Flinging himself down on the seat, he
preluded wildly in imitation of Rubinstein. His hearers sat with their
mouths open, a fixed smile on their faces, laughter ready in their
throats, and only Madeleine was coolly contemptuous.

"Tom-fool!" she said in a low voice.

Krafft was confidently expected to burst into one of those
songs for which he was renowned. Few of his friends were able to sing
them, and no one but himself could both sing and play them
simultaneously: they were a monstrous, standing joke. Instead of this,
however, he turned, winked at his audience, and began a slow,
melancholy ditty, with a recurring refrain. He was not allowed to
finish the first verse; a howl of disapproval went up; his hearers
hooted, jeered and stamped.

"Sick cats!"

"Damn your 'WENIG SONNE!'"--this was the refrain.

"Put your head in a bag!"

"Pity he drinks!"

"Give us one of the rousers--the rou . . . sers!"

Krafft himself laughed unbridledly. "DAS ICH SPRICHT!"--he announced.
"In C sharp major."

There was a hush of anticipation, in which Dove, stopping his BRETZEL