The Four Corners Abroad

"No, indeed, but I hate to think of your going down in the dark."

"Do you think I'm afraid of the dark, Nan Corner?"

"Of course not, but – "

"You are, I verily believe."

"Not exactly, only it would have been sort of boogy and spooky if I had to come through that court and up that first flight by myself."

"And it would not have been the proper thing for you to do."

"Nobody ever imagined that in this age such a necessity would arise. We will all petition for a light at the very entrance. I know mother and Aunt Helen will be horrified at this outer darkness. I was so thankful to see you, though at first – "

"Own up you were scared."

"Yes, I was, and with good reason. I saw you stop and I tried to climb in through the keyhole or the crack of the door, but couldn't. Oh, but I was thankful it was you, and I remember it isn't the first time you've proved a friend in need. I don't forget last year. Be sure to come early to-morrow. I am wild to hear all about Aunt Sarah and the boys, not to mention all the other dear people at home. Good-night. Won't you take my candle, even if you don't the candlestick?"

"No, I would dribble the grease all over myself. Good-night and thanks for the key."

Nan stood holding the candle over the baluster until the last footfall had ceased and then she unlocked the door which led into Fräulein Bauer's apartment. She found her mother and her Aunt Helen waiting for her. A tray on the table held rolls and butter, some slices of cold ham, a glass of milk and a compote of apples. "I am so glad you waited up for me," said the girl as she came in.

"It isn't very late," said her aunt, "so it is nothing of a favor."

"I know it isn't, but it seems as if I had been away days."

"Has it been as great as all that?" asked her mother. "I am glad to see you back safe and sound. Fräulein Bauer said she would have a candle below for you, so I knew you would find your way in."

"Yes, but it is as dark as pitch on the ground floor, and it isn't like it is in Paris where the concierge is right at hand to let you in if necessary. I suppose there is a Hausmann, but there are no signs of his having rooms anywhere about."

"And you say there is no light at the entrance?"

"Not a glimmer; it is as black as a wolf's mouth."

"That will never do," said Mrs. Corner decidedly. "We can never in the world stay here under such conditions. Suppose we have callers in the evening, what is to be done?"

"Give it up," returned Nan.

"And for ourselves, a party of ladies coming in after dark to be obliged to enter a dark court and come up as dark a stairway is not to be thought of. That must be remedied at once. I shall see to it to-morrow."

"So the opera was great, was it, Nan?" said her aunt.

"I should think it was. I will tell you all about it presently. At first I didn't believe I could ever think of anything else for days, but I had an adventure and – "

"What do you mean, Nan?" asked her mother in alarm.

Then Nan told about the missing key, the meeting with Dr. Paul Woods and the journey up-stairs. "I was scared to death at first," she admitted.

"I was right in my misgivings about letting you go off alone," said her mother. "I cannot understand how Frau Burg-Schmidt should have left you to come in by yourself."

"She didn't think anything of it, for there were ever so many girls coming home by themselves. Frau Burg-Schmidt did get out with me, of course, and would have come all the way, but she had to change cars and her car happened to come along right away, so as she knew I had a key and that I was but a few steps from the door she left me. If I hadn't been so stupid as to forget about changing the keys from the bag to the chain it would have been all right. No, it wouldn't have been quite all right, for I should have had to grope my way up that dark stairway alone. Oh, but I was glad to see Dr. Paul. He always was a dear. Wasn't it strange that it should happen to be he who came along at just the right moment?"

"It certainly was most fortunate," acknowledged her mother. "Is he to be here for any length of time?"

"Oh, my yes. He is going to do some studying and we shall see him often. Now I will tell you about the opera. It was heavenly, and the stage setting was perfectly fine. I shall never forget that beautiful blue and silver Lohengrin and I was so mad with Elsa for doubting him, yet I was sorry for her, too, because it was all that wicked Ortrud's fault. The music was divine. Such an orchestra! and Knote sang like an angel; you never heard a more beautiful voice, and oh, mother, it was so perfectly fine to have Frau Burg-Schmidt explain the different motives to me and tell me when they came in. You have no idea how much more interesting it made it. She is going over the score with me and wants me to learn to distinguish for myself. I think I can pick out several already. She is so enthusiastic and rouses your ambition so you want to do your very best."

"But I cannot excuse her leaving you in the street like that, and I am afraid I cannot allow you to go out with her, if there is a chance of such a thing occurring again."

"Oh, mother, please don't say that, and please don't say anything to her about it, for I think she is very sensitive and high-strung, and it really was my fault for being so stupid as to forget where I put the keys."

"That may have been a part of the trouble, but a woman of Frau Burg-Schmidt's experience should know better than to desert a young girl like you at this time of night in a foreign city." Then seeing Nan's look of distress, she added, "However, we will not talk any more about it now, but provide against such a contingency next time. Did you have good places?"

"Very good; that is, it was a fine place for hearing the music, and all the musical people prefer it to the parquet or the balcony where the seats are much higher priced. And, mother, I might have gone in my school dress for all it mattered. People wear anything; flannel blouses, queer reform frocks which look perfectly dreadful on the fat women – all sorts of funny rigs are worn. They sit around and munch chocolate or take rolls from their bags and nibble those between the acts or eat pretzels. It is the most free and easy place I ever saw. For all that, there was perfect order, not a whisper while the music was going on. Of course the lights are turned down during the performance and are only turned up when the curtain drops. Every one was so absorbed and didn't dream of talking or looking bored as I have seen them do at home at plays."

"I must confess there is that advantage on the part of a German audience," remarked Miss Helen. "They go for the pure purpose of hearing the music, not to show their clothes nor to chatter with their friends nor because it is fashionable, and I think we may well take pattern from them in our big cities."

"And the enthusiasm," Nan went on; "it made me wild to hear them call and call for Knote and for Morena. Oh, I did enjoy it. I shall never forget this night."

"But you are forgetting to eat anything," said her mother.

"I'll drink the milk, but I really don't feel hungry, for I am too excited; besides Frau Burg-Schmidt had some chocolate with her and I ate a piece of that. I must go to bed, for Dr. Paul is coming early to see us and to return the key. I have had such a glorious time, mother dear, so please forget the adventure part of it."

"Don't lie awake thinking about Lohengrin," said her mother kissing her good-night.

"I'll try not."

"I hope it hasn't been too much for that excitable brain of hers," said Mrs. Corner as Nan went out.

"Nan will always be intense," replied Miss Helen. "We can't deprive her of such joy as she finds in music because of that."

"No, but she does enjoy things with such a vengeance."

"And suffers in proportion. That is the way she is built, Mary."

"Like her father, very like."

"Dear Jack. Yes, she is like him."

The two sat lost in thought for a while. Presently Miss Helen spoke. "How old is this Dr. Paul Woods?" she asked. "I have almost forgotten. He was away at college while we were at Uplands."

"He is not more than twenty-three or four. A very bright young man and a fine one. I've known him since he was born. His father has always been our family physician, you know, Helen, and Mrs. Woods is one of my dearest friends."

"Yes, I remember that. Mother always preferred Dr. Harley, so I never saw much of the Woods," said Miss Helen folding up her newspaper and rising. "It is bedtime, Mary."

"I know. I am going." But Mrs. Corner sat for another half hour, her book unnoticed before her.

CHAPTER XI

SETTLING DOWN

The problem of getting opera tickets was solved the next day when Dr. Woods made his visit. "I have promised myself to stand in line every week," he said, "and if you will commit the buying of the tickets to my charge I promise to do my best for you. It is just as easy to buy four or five tickets as one. I shall probably not treat myself to anything more expensive than places in the Dritte Rang, but I can get yours anywhere you say, provided there is a chance of doing it."

"That relieves us of a great responsibility," said Miss Helen, "though it seems rather an imposition upon you."

"Not a bit of it. I should be very unhappy to know that any of you ladies were on your feet out there in the cold when there was a man around to do the standing for you."

"Spoken like a true American and a Virginia gentleman at that," said Miss Helen. "Nan proposed to be our opera ticket buyer, as she is the most interested, but her mother objected."

The doctor gave a quick glance at the slender dark-haired girl, almost too tall for her years. "As her medical man I sternly forbid it, too," he said. "It is not the thing for any delicately bred woman to do. Some of these sturdy Germans may be equal to it, but none of your race. No, Miss Helen, I insist upon your letting that duty fall upon me."

"Then please accept our united thanks. We do want Nan to have as much opera as is good for her, but we don't feel that we always shall want to pay for the highest priced seats, if we can get any at all at lower rates."

"I shall frequently make a rush for Stehplatz," declared the doctor, "for I am putting all my spare cash into my work and my amusements must be of the cheap kind. However, there couldn't be a better place to find such. One can listen to a first-class concert for the meagre price of fifteen or twenty cents, if you don't mind going to a concert hall where people sit around little tables and drink beer. It is always most quiet and orderly and you see a good class of persons at such places, for they want to hear the music and do not want the least noise."

"Every one in Munich drinks beer," remarked Nan. "Even the München kindel is often pictured with a glass of beer in one hand and a bunch of radishes in the other."

"Who is the München kindel?" asked the doctor.

"Have you been in the city twenty-four hours and have not made its acquaintance? Why, it is everywhere, on calendars, cards, liqueur glasses, all sorts of souvenirs, bonbon boxes, signs, and I have even seen the little monkish hood and cloak imitated in a covering for my lady's pet dog. Here," she picked up a guide-book from the table and handed it to him.

"Oh, that? Yes, I have seen the little fellow, but I didn't know what it meant except that it seemed a sign and seal of something Münchener. Do you know its origin?"

"I know something, though no one appears exactly to know why it happens to be a child. You probably know that Munich originally belonged to the monks who lived in a monastery on the Tegernsee. Their place was called München. There are a number of stories about how the little kindel happened to be used, but Aunt Helen says it was probably adopted as the seal of those way back monks. Some one told me that there is a legend which says our Lord came in the form of a little child in monkish dress to bless the town and the good work of the monks, and that ever since the München kindel has been honored. Others say that it is simply because as time has gone on different artists and sculptors have tried to improve on the original design and it has become what it is now. I like the legend best though perhaps the other is truer. I have become very fond of the little monk's smiling countenance. Sometimes he has a book in one hand and two fingers of the other are outstretched in benediction, but when he is very hilarious, he waves a stein of beer in one hand and a bunch of radishes in the other."

"Wise Nan," said the doctor. "Whenever I want archaic information about the city I shall come to you."

"Nan may be able to tell you all about those funny old things," broke in Jack, "but what I want to hear about, Dr. Paul, is home. Did you see Phil and Gordon? How was Aunt Sarah when you left? Is Mitty there? Are the cats looking all right? What was old Pete mule doing when you saw him last?"

Every one laughed and then every one turned eagerly to the doctor, for what did not Jack's questions bring before them? The old brown house, with the garden behind it wandering up-hill, Aunt Sarah bustling around, Phil with Trouble at his heels running across the field between his own home and the Corners', Old Pete standing by an angle of the fence, wagging his long ears as he looked up and down the road.

"Do tell us about everything," said Mrs. Corner drawing her chair a little nearer.

"Miss Sarah was very well and getting ready for her boys who hadn't come when I left," responded the doctor. "I saw a pair of black legs scudding across the garden and I fancy they must have been Mitty's. As for Pete, I am afraid I don't remember about him, and I did not see any of the cats. Yes, I did; a big gray Angora came out and blinked at me as I was saying good-bye to Miss Sarah."

"That must have been Lady Grey," remarked Jack.

"The Lewis's are all well. Miss Polly is to be married at Christmas, as I suppose you all know."

"Oh, dear, and we shan't be there," sighed Mary Lee. At that moment the glories of travel, the novelties of foreign lands were as nothing compared to the bond which linked them to old Virginia.

"And your own family?" said Mrs. Corner. "Your mother and father?"

"Mother is well and so is father, better than usual. A new doctor has settled in town, an enterprising young fellow with the acquirements of foreign study still clinging to him. Father said that if I meant to hold my own in the town I must study abroad, too, and if eventually I concluded to step aside and let Hastings have the field I would need some work over here wherever I might settle. He thinks he can keep up our end for six months and then I shall go back and make up my mind whether father shall retire in my behalf, or whether he will keep a few of his oldest patients and transfer the rest to Dr. Hastings."

"You are not going to desert us, Dr. Paul?" said Mrs. Corner.

"I am not sure. At all events we shall see when I get back. You all have deserted your old neighbors, why shouldn't I follow your example?"

"But not for always," said Nan eagerly. "We shall go back to stay some day, shan't we, mother?"

"Are you sure you will want to, Nan?"

"I am sure I would like to feel that I could come away sometimes, but there is no place like home. I want to live most of my life there, and I surely want to die just where I was born."

"It isn't a very big world, that little town of ours," said Dr. Paul smiling at her ardor.

"It is big enough. After we have seen the great outside world it will be the most delightful thing to go back and think about it all."

"And your music, your college career and all that?" said Miss Helen.

"Don't you think it will give as much pleasure there, the music, I mean, as anywhere? And I am sure our University has brains enough in it to keep my poor supply guessing. Nobody need rust out where our University is." Nan spoke proudly.

"Good for you, Nan!" cried the doctor. "You are loyal to the core. That is the way to talk. I am going to sit down this very night and write to father about what you have said. It will do him good to know how you feel. He thinks a lot of Miss Nancy Corner."

"Must you go?" said Mrs. Corner as he rose to take his leave.

"Yes, I must. I am not fairly in harness yet, but I have a lot to do."

"You will come in and see us often, I hope."

"Won't I? Mother is depending on it, I can tell you. The fact of you all being here made it easier for her to see me go. And Mrs. Corner, remember, I am yours to command. You must not fail to call upon me for anything in the wide world that I can do for you, just as you would on Tom Lewis or any of the boys at home. I want the privilege of being your right hand man, as I am the only one of your townsmen here."

"You are a dear boy," said Mrs. Corner laying her hand affectionately on his shoulder, "and I shall be delighted to take you at your word whenever occasion requires on condition that you write to your mother that I say she needn't worry over her son while Mary Corner is on hand to have an eye to him."

"I'll do it and it will be no end of comfort to her. She expects me to come home with forty slashes on my face and an insatiable thirst for beer."

"Are you going to wear a green or a blue cap or what color?" asked Jean.

"I'll wear my own American headgear, if you please."

"And you won't have those sword cuts all over your face?" said Jack.

"Not if my present stock of vanity holds out. I am afraid you would never be my sweetheart if I allowed myself to be hacked up in that style, Jack."

"Oh, but I shall never be your sweetheart," returned Jack calmly. "I am Carter's. I used to be Clarence's, but I most forget him, and he doesn't write to me, but Carter does."

"I see. Well, anyhow, I shall not submit to having my noble countenance marred. Now, I must go, Mrs. Corner. It is so good to see you all and such a temptation to stand and talk. I'll come soon again, if I may."

"As often as you please. I've neither music nor German to absorb me, for I intend to spare myself all I can, so when the others are busy you will find at least one at leisure," Mrs. Corner assured him and he went off leaving all with a feeling of nearness to home which his presence had given.

A new arrival at the pension that day filled the last of Fräulein Bauer's rooms, and decided who was to complete the house party. A pleasant American woman with her son and daughter took rooms opposite the Corners. The family now consisted of the six Corners with Jo Keyes, Mrs. Hoyt, son Maurice and daughter Juliet, a stout Russian lady and her son, "the Herr Professor," as the Fräulein called him, a jovial German, and a severe looking dame whose nationality no one seemed to know. Nan insisted that this last person was a Nihilist, while Jo declared she was an American refugee. Mary Lee thought she must be Italian, because she liked macaroni and asked for more olive oil on her salad. She did not seem to be very fluent with German, though no one had heard her speak any other language. She sat at the extreme end of the table, and bowed with great stateliness to the others whenever she came in or went out.

It was Miss Helen who at last discovered the lady's nationality, and announced with great glee that she knew.

"I am positive she is Russian or Polish or something like that," declared Nan. "I am sure she has a bomb concealed in her room and has designs upon the Prince Regent."

"I am convinced she is Italian," Mary Lee differed from her sister. "She has such black eyes and hair, and I saw her with a letter in her hand that had an Italian stamp on it, and it was addressed to Signorina something or other."

This seemed fairly good proof, but still Miss Helen shook her head.

"She might be Spanish," ventured Jo, "for, as you say, Mary Lee, she is very dark. If she were Russian why doesn't she talk to the other Russians at the table?"

"I hadn't thought of that," said Nan, "though maybe she doesn't want them to know she is Russian for fear they will find out her plots."

Miss Helen laughed aloud. "You are away off, Nan," she said.

"Perhaps she is a Greek." Jack thought up this.

"Or a-a-Austrian," Jean ventured.

"Then she'd speak better German," objected Nan.

"What do you say, Mary?" asked Miss Helen. "No one so far has guessed right. You must have a chance."

"She might be French, perhaps Canadian French."

"But the Italian letter," spoke up Mary Lee.

"I had one from Italy myself this morning addressed to Signora Corner," Mrs. Corner told her.

"Then that falls through," said Jo. "Give it up, Miss Helen."

"My dears, she's plain, dyed-in-the-wool, United States American, from Chelsea, Massachusetts."

"Oh, oh," came a chorus of laughing exclamations. "The very idea! How did you find it out?"

"I encountered her on my way down-stairs this morning, and she asked me if I knew where she could find a second-hand book-shop. I happened to know of one and I told her. We were going in the same direction and we walked together a little way."

"Is she any kind of an anything?" asked Jack.

"That is rather a vague question," said Miss Helen. "Couldn't you be a little more exact, Jack dear?"

"I mean is she a doctor or a teacher or anything like that? She looks like she might be something besides just a plain woman."

"She certainly is a plain enough woman," remarked Nan with a laugh.

"She didn't mention that she had a profession, though I think she is here for a special purpose, perhaps," Miss Helen told them.

"American," said Jo reminiscently; "that's the limit. It shows that one can never tell. Why, we might have discussed our most intimate affairs before her, and never have dreamed she could understand a word of what we said."

"Which goes to show that one must be very careful about one's speech when traveling abroad," said Mrs. Corner.

"What do you think of the new girl and boy?" Jo asked Nan that same day.

"They're rather nice, I think. The boy seems a jolly sort of somebody and the girl is very friendly. They are going to school and seem to have a number of friends here, which will make it pleasant for us. Mother likes Mrs. Hoyt. They know some of the same people at home and spent an hour reminiscing after dinner. I am glad on mother's account, and Aunt Helen's, too, that she is so nice."

The American part of the pension soon resolved itself into a very congenial party. Nan struck up a friendship with Juliet Hoyt, while Maurice dangled after Jo and Mary Lee. Maurice was a merry, gentlemanly lad with dancing brown eyes, and a frank mouth. He was always ready for fun, and as both Mary Lee and Jo were very fond of outdoor sports the three had long walks together and promised themselves later that they would skate and rodel and ski as often as they could.

It was not long before Maurice's schoolmates found out that Mrs. Hoyt's sitting-room was a very pleasant place, and that she herself was a sympathetic person into whose ears they could pour their woes or whom they could come to in hours of homesickness to be comforted, therefore there was scarcely a day passed but some one of Dr. Mann's schoolboys wandered into Pension Bauer for cheer.

Nan and Mary Lee had always been thrown a great deal with their boy cousins, and Jo was so full of life that she naturally attracted boys, so it must be confessed that Mrs. Hoyt was not the one chiefly sought. "But there is safety in numbers," she said to Mrs. Corner, "and I want my children to have good honest friendships among both boys and girls, so do please let your young people frolic with mine; it won't hurt them one bit. Moreover I think it is much the better plan to allow them to have their friends here where I can overlook them and take part in what goes on. It seems to me that the surest way of keeping the confidence of both my boy and girl is not to be too severely critical, and to make whatever place stands for home as happy as possible."

Mrs. Corner quite agreed with her, and though half a dozen boys vied with one another to see which could nearest match in socks and neckties the color of Jo's winter suit, the Sunday after she appeared in it, and though Maurice insisted upon sending daily notes to Mary Lee these were all very harmless matters. It was something to make even their elders laugh to see the six boys in green socks and neckties as near of a color as possible, and when Mrs. Corner read the little jokes which passed for notes she saw what very innocent nonsense it all was. So the young folks had the best of times and afforded much amusement to their families.