"Where is the Fraulein who wanted her voice tried?" he said curtly, "If she is present she may come forward." He took out his watch and glanced at it. "The chorus may wait," he said, "Look at your scores meanwhile, meine Herren, meine Damen--and notice the marks!
A slim figure with a cloak about her shoulders, bareheaded, approached from the wings; her curls, cut short like a boy's, sparkled and gleamed. The Kapellmeister surveyed her coldly as she drew nearer, and then he turned and seated himself at the piano.
"Your voice," he said shortly, "Hm--what?"
"We have enough sopranos--too many now! We don't know what to do with them all."
The girl shivered a little under the cloak.
"Oh!" she faltered, "Then you won't hear me?"
"I never said I wouldn't hear you, Madame; I simply warned you. If you were alto now--but for a soprano there is one chance in a thousand, unless--" He struck a chord on the piano.
The chorus sat very still. The trying of a new voice was always a diversion; it was more amusing to watch the grilling of a victim than to be scorched themselves; and the Kapellmeister in that mood--oh Je! They smiled warily at one another behind their scores, and stared at the slight, girlish figure beside the pianoforte.
She was stooping a little as if near-sighted, looking over the shoulder of the Conductor at the music on the piano rack.
"So," he said, "Then you either have a voice, or you haven't, one or the other. Where did you study?"
The girl hesitated a moment; then she bent lower and whispered to him: "St. Petersburg, Monsieur, with Helmanoff."
"You are not French then, you are Russian? They told me Mademoiselle Pou--Pou--"
Kaya quivered a moment: "I am--Russian," she said, "I am an exile. Don't ask, Monsieur--not here! I am--I am afraid."
The Kapellmeister went on improvising arpeggios on the piano as if he had not heard. He seemed to be pondering. "That name--" he said, "Pou--Poussin! Someone called on me the other day of that name. I remember it, because when I came in she was gone. Was it you?"
He turned suddenly and looked at her: "You are young," he said, "and too slim to have a voice. Na--child! You are trembling as if you had a chill, and the House is like an oven. Come--don't be frightened. The chorus are owls; they can stare and screech, but they know nothing. Sit down here by me and sing what you choose. Let your voice out."