The Street of Seven Stars

ustrian city had been a royal game preserve. Tradition had it that the Empress Maria Theresa had used th

fully obscured by gloom, it was easy to believe that the great empress herself had sat in one of the tall old chairs

heavy barred gate, left open by the last comer, a piano student named Scatchett and dubbed "Scatch"-the gate slammed to and fro monot

d served to give light if not festivity to the afternoon coffee and cakes. It still burned, a gnarled and stubby fragment, in its china holder; round it the disorder of the recent refreshment,

ong the uneven old floor. At the sound a girl in a black dress, who had been huddled near the tile stove, rose impatiently and picked it up. There was no impatience, however, in the way sh

grand piano. There were no rugs-the bare floor stretched bleakly into dim corners and was lost. The crystal pendants of

ul of matches proceeded to the unheard-of extravagance of lighting it, not here and there,

ish fluid in the cups had been made with coffee extract that had been made of Heaven knows what; and it revealed in the cavernous corner near the door a number of trunks. The girl, having lighted all the candles, stood on the chair and looked at the trunks.

nances of early rising and two hours of scales before breakfast, working with stiffened fingers in her cold little room where there was no room for a stove, and sitting on the edge of the bed in a faded kimono where once pink butterflies sported in a once blue-silk garden. Then coffee, rolls, and honey, and back again to work, with litt

his featherbed in the lodge below, he opened his door and listened to Harmony doin

g with the knot of his mustache bandage, "what a pe

y coal, coal to heat; and at night the wi

er heart full, indeed, of music, but her head much occupied with the trousseau in her trunks. The Harmar sisters had gone two weeks before, their funds having given out.

suit, too, a marvel of tailoring and cheapness, and a willow plume that would have cost treble its price in New York. Oh, yes, gala days, indeed, to offset the butter and the rainy winter and the faltering technic and the anxiety about money. For that they all had always, the old tragedy of the American m

ne of the unfit, on whom even the undermasters refuse to waste time. That has been, and often.

outing briskly, "whe

tch from behind

where! Do you need it reall

ake you. Half the teeth are out of my comb. I d

, while Scatch obeye

y's bedroom slippers. Oh, Harry, I found your slippers!

he said. "I'm com

ia Theresa, and looked at her eyes. They were still red. Pe

or. She held her shabby wrapper about her and listened just inside the door. There were no footsteps, only the banging of

d. "Under my be

ndle in hand, inspected the dusty floor beneath her bed. It revealed nothing but a cigarette, on which

l out the wardrobe, Scatch; there may

ian cigarettes with a government monopoly and gi

ther?" she aske

powde

the china lid and drop

but still in a whisper, "added to what

. Heaven knows it was hard enough to get together, without losing it now. I'll ha

ett with her eyes glowing. "If

mony is going to need? She's going to be alone-and this is a bad town to be alone in. And she is not like us. You have your Henry. I'm a beefy person who has a stomach, and I'm tha

hett was rat

cepted in the little colony that Harmony was a

Soprano

a better word. Only the rich oug

irl's head, and anyhow Harm

pillow," she whisper

e Big Soprano heating a cur