CHAPTER XXVII

AULD LANG SYNE

A week or two later, one bright spring afternoon, Will was strolling by

himself down the sunny side of Bond Street. All the world was there—for

the world was in town—and the pavements were crowded. But Will moved

through the stream of well-dressed dawdlers, seeing and hearing little.

In the midst of all that idle throng, his head was full of melodies; he

was working up rhymes to ready-made tunes, undisturbed by the hubbub and

din of London. Of a sudden, somebody stopped and stood straight in front

of him. “Mr Deverill, I believe!” a tuneful voice said, brusquely.

Will’s eyes returned at once from heaven to earth, and saw standing

before them—a tall young man, of somewhat defiant aspect, dressed in

the black frock coat and shiny silk hat of Metropolitan respectability.

Will paused, and surveyed him. He was a good-looking young man, with

much swagger in his air, and a black moustache on his upper lip; but his

face seemed somehow strangely familiar to Will, while his voice stirred

at once some latent chord in the dim depths of his memory. But he wasn’t

one of Will’s fine London acquaintances—the poet saw that much at once

by the cheap pretentiousness of his coat and hat, the flaring blue of

his made-up silk tie, the obtrusive glitter of the false diamond pin

which adorned its centre. The stranger’s get-up, indeed, was redolent of

the music halls. Yet he was handsome for all that, with a certain

strange air of native distinction, not wholly concealed by the vulgar

tone of his costume and his solicitous jewellery. Will held out his hand

with that dubitative air which we all of us display in the first moment

of uncertainty towards half-recognised acquaintances.

“I see you have forgotten me, zen,” the stranger said, in very decent

English, drawing himself up with great dignity, and twirling his black

moustache airily between one thumb and forefinger. “It is long, to be

sure, since we met in ze Tyrol. And I have changed much since zen, no

doubt: I have mixed with ze world; I have grown what you call in English

cosmopolitan. But I see it comes back; I see you remember me now; my

voice recalls it to you.”

Will grasped his hand more cordially. “Yes, perfectly, when you speak,”

he said; “though you are very much changed indeed, as you say; but I see

you’re Franz Lindner.”

“Yes; I’m Mr Franz Lindner,” the stranger replied, half-imperceptibly

correcting him—for it was indeed the Robbler. Will scanned him from

head to foot, and took him in at a glance. He was a fiery young man

still, and his mien, as of old, was part fierce, part saucy. But, oh,

what a difference the change of dress had made in him! No conical hat,

no blackcock’s feather now, whether “turned” or otherwise. In his

Tyrolese costume, with his rifle in his hand, and his cartridges at his

side, Franz Lindner had looked and moved of yore a typical Alpine

_jäger_. But, in black frock-coat and shiny tall hat, strolling like a

civilised snob that he was down the flags of Bond Street, all the

romance and poetry had faded utterly out of him. The glamour was gone.

He looked and moved for all the world to-day like any other young man of

the baser mock-swell sort, dressed up in his Sunday best to lounge and

ogle and bandy vulgar chaff in Burlington Arcade with his predestined

companions.

“Why, what has brought you to London, then?” Will asked, much

astonished.

“Art, art,” the transfigured Robbler responded, offhand, with inimitable

swagger. “You must surely zen know my stage name, zough you don’t seem

to have heard me.” He pulled out a printed card, and handed it to Will

with a flourish. “I am ze Signor Francesco,” he continued, “all ze world

is talking about.” And he threw back his chin and cocked his head on one

side, looking, even as he spoke, more pretentious than ever.

“Oh, indeed!” Will answered with a bewildered little laugh. But it was

the non-committing “Oh, indeed!” of mere polite acquiescence.

Franz Lindner caught the tinge of implied non-recognition in the

Englishman’s voice, and hastened to add, as if parenthetically, “I

perform at ze Pavilion.”

“What, the London Pavilion at the top of the Hay market?” Will

exclaimed, beginning to realise.

Franz Lindner looked hurt. “I’ve seen _your_ name often enough,” he

said, asserting himself still more vigorously as Will seemed to know

less of him; “and I sought, as you were a pillar of ze profession

yourself, you would certainly have seen _mine_, if it were only on ze

posters. I’m advertised largely. All London rings wis me. Ze County

Council has even taken notice of me. I’m a public character! And I have

had ze intention more zan once of looking you up, as also Mr Florian.

But zere, here in London our time is so occupied! You and I, who are

public men, wis professional engagements—we are ever overtaxed; we know

not how to find ze leisure or ze space for ze claims of friendship.”

“Have you been long in London?” Will asked, turning down with him

towards Piccadilly.

“More zan two years now,” the Robbler answered briskly, lounging on at

his own pace, with a cane in his gloved hand, and staring hard, as he

passed, at every pretty girl he saw on foot or in the carriages. “After

I leave you at Meran, I worked my way slowly—singing, singing, ever

singing—by degrees to Paris. But Paris didn’t suit me; zere is too much

_blague_ zere; zey go in for buffoons; zey laugh at a man of modest

merit. I hate _blague_ myself. So zen I came on pretty soon to London.

At first I had to sing in common low music halls—sous side and zat; but

talent, talent is sure to make its way in ze end. I rose very quick, and

now—I am at ze head of my branch of ze profession.”

“You sing, of course?” Will interposed, restraining a smile at the

Robbler’s delicious self-satisfaction. The man himself was the very same

as ever, to be sure; but ’twas strange what a difference mere externals

had made in him!

“Yes; I sing, and sometimes, too, I play ze zither. But mostly, I sing.

It surprises me, indeed, you should not have heard of my singing.”

“And what’s the particular branch of which you’re the acknowledged

head?” Will asked, still amused at the Tyroler’s complacency.

Franz Lindner held his head very high in the air, and gave a twirl to

his cane, as he answered, with much importance, “My line is ze Mammoss

Continental Comique; ze serio-comic foreigner; zey call me Frenchy. I

sing ze well-known songs in broken English zat are in everybody’s

mous—‘Mossoo Robert is my name,’ or ‘Lay-ces-terre Squarre,’ or ‘Ze

leetle black dawg,’ or ‘Zat lohvely Matilda.’ I wonder you have not

heard of me. ‘Mossoo Robert’ is all ze talk of London. Frank Wilkins

writes songs especially for my voice. If you look in ze music shops, you

will see on ze covers, ‘Written expressly for Signor Francesco.’ Signor

Francesco—zat’s me!” And he tapped his breast, and swelled himself

visibly.

“I remember to have seen the name, I think,” Will answered, with a

slight internal shudder, well pleased, none the less, to give some tardy

salve to his companion’s wounded vanity. “I’m glad you’ve got on, and

delighted to find you have such kindly recollections of me.”

Franz Lindner laughed. “Oh, zat!” he said, snapping his fingers in the

air very jauntily. “I was a hot young man zen; I knew little of ze

world. You mustn’t sink much of what a young man did in ze days before

he knew how Society is managed. I owe you no grudge. We were bose of us

younger. Besides, our friend Hausberger has wiped out our old scores. I

have transferred to him, entire, all my feelings in ze matter.”

“That’s well,” Will replied, anxious indeed to learn whether the Tyroler

had heard anything fresh of late years about Linnet. “And Hausberger

himself? What of him . . . and his wife? Have you ever knocked up

against them?”

The Robbler’s brow gathered; his hand clenched his cane hard. It was

clear civilisation and cosmopolitanism, however neatly veneered, hadn’t

made much serious change in his underlying nature. “Zat rascal!” he

exclaimed, bringing his stick down on the pavement with a noisy little

thud; “zat rogue; zat liar! If ever I _had_ come across him, it would be

bad for his head. Sousand devils, what a man! . . . Here, we’re close to

ze Cri; will you come and have a drink? We can talk zis over afterward.

I like to offer somesing to a friend new discovered.”

“It’s not much in my line,” Will answered, smiling; “but still, for old

times’ sake, I’ll go in and have a glass with you.” To say the truth, he

was so eager to find out what Franz might have to communicate that he

stretched a point for once, and broke through his otherwise invariable

rule never to drink anything anywhere except at meal times.

Franz stalked along Piccadilly, and strode airily into the Criterion

like one who knew his way well about the London restaurants. “What’ll

you take?” he asked of Will in an assured tone, which showed the

question in English was a very familiar one to him.

“Whatever you take yourself,” Will answered, much amused, for the

Tyroler was far more at home than himself in a London bar, and far more

at his ease with the London barmaid.

“Two half porters and two small Scotch, miss,” the Robbler cried briskly

to the tousely-haired young woman who attended to his call. “You’ll find

it a very good mixture for zis time of day, Mr Deverill. I always take

it myself. It softens ze organ.”

The young woman fulfilled the order with unwonted alacrity—Franz was a

favourite at the bar, and gave his commands leaning across it with the

arch smile of an _habitué_—and Will then discovered that the mixture in

question consisted of a glass of Dublin stout, well fortified with a

thimbleful of Highland whisky. He also observed, what he had not at

first sight noticed, that Franz Lindner’s face, somewhat redder than of

old, bore evidence, perhaps, of too frequent efforts for the softening

of the organ. Franz nodded to the barmaid.

“Here’s our meeting!” he said to Will. “Shall we step a little aside

here? We can talk wisout overhearing.”

They drew aside to a round table for their unfinished gossip. “You’re

not in town often, I suppose,” the Tyroler began, scanning his companion

from head to foot with a critical scrutiny.

“Why, I live here,” Will answered, taken aback—“in Craven Street,

Strand; I’ve always lived here.”

“Oh, indeed,” the Robbler responded, with a somewhat superior air; “I

sought from your costume you’d just come up from ze country.”

Will smiled good-humouredly. He was wearing, in point of fact, a soft

slouch hat and a dusty brown suit of somewhat poetical cut, which

contrasted in more ways than one with the music-hall singer’s too

elaborate parody of the glossy silk chimney-pot and regulation

frock-coat of the orthodox Belgravian.

Then Franz came back at a bound to the subject he had quitted on the

flags of Piccadilly. He explained, with much circumlocution and many

needless expletives, how he had heard from time to time, through common

friends at St Valentin, that Andreas Hausberger and his wife had

fluctuated of late years between summer at Munich, Leipzig, Stuttgart,

and winter at Milan, Florence, Naples, Venice. Linnet got on with him

very well—oh, very well indeed—yes; Linnet, you know, was just the

sort of girl to get on very well with pretty nearly anyone. No doubt by

this time she’d settled down into tolerably amicable relations with

Andreas Hausberger! Any children? Oh dear, no; Hausberger’d take care of

that; a public singer’s time is far too valuable to be wasted on the

troubles of a growing young family. Had she come out yet? Well, yes;

that is to say, from time to time she’d sung at concerts in Munich,

Florence, and elsewhere. Successfully? Of course; she’d a very good

voice, as voices go, for her sort, and training was sure to do something

at least for it. Franz had heard rumours she was engaged next season for

San Carlo at Naples; you might count upon Hausberger’s doing his very

best, now he’d invested his savings in preparing her for the stage, to

make money out of his bargain.

Through all Franz said, however, there ran still, as of yore, one

constant thread of undying hatred to the man who had outwitted him at

Meran and St Valentin. “Then you haven’t forgiven him yet?” Will

inquired at last, after one such spiteful allusion to Andreas’s

meanness.

The Robbler’s hand moved instinctively of itself to his left breast

pocket. He had changed his coat, but not his customs. “I carry it here

still,” he answered, with the same old defiant air, just defining with

finger and thumb the vague outline of the knife that bulged between them

through the glossy broadcloth. “It’s always ready for him. Ze day I meet

him—” and he stopped short suddenly, with a face like a bulldog’s.

“You Tyrolers have long memories,” Will answered, with a little shudder.

“It’s very unfashionable you know, to stab a rival in London.”

Franz showed his handsome teeth. “Unfashionable or not,” he replied,

with a shrug, “it is so I was born; it is so I live ever. As we say in

ze song, I am made zat way. I cannot help it. I never forget an

injury. . . . Zough, mind you,” he continued, after a telling little

pause, during which he drove many times an imaginary knife into an

invisible enemy, “it isn’t so much now zat I grudge him Linnet. Let him

keep his fine Frau. Zere are better girls in ze world, you and I have

found out, zan Lina Telser—to-day Frau Hausberger. We were younger zen;

we are men of ze world now; we know higher sings, I sink, zan a

Zillerthal _sennerin_. What I feel wis him at present is not so much zat

he took away ze girl, as zat he played me so mean a trick to take her.”

Will smiled to himself in silence. How strangely human feelings and

ideas differ! He himself had never forgotten the beautiful alp-girl with

the divine voice; in the midst of London drawing-rooms he never ceased

to miss her; while Franz Lindner thought he had left Linnet far, far

behind, since he became acquainted with those higher and nobler types,

the music-hall stars of the London Pavilion! “There’s no accounting for

tastes,” people say; oh, most inept of proverbs! surely it’s easy for

anyone to account for the reasons which made Linnet appear so different

now in Franz Lindner’s eyes and in her English poet’s.

But before Franz and Will parted at the Circus that afternoon, they had

made mutual promises, for old acquaintance’s sake—Franz, that he would

graciously accept a stall, on an off-night, at the Duke of Edinburgh’s,

to see Will’s new piece, _The Duchess of Modena_; and Will, that he

would betake himself to the London Pavilion one of these next few

evenings, to hear Signor Francesco, alias the Frenchy, in his celebrated

and universally encored impersonation of Mossoo Robert in Regent Street.