That the beautiful face was but a transparent mask of a deformed,
dwarfed, contemptible little soul was speedily made evident. The
cream and a silly flirtation with her empty-headed attendant--a
pallid youth who parted his hair like a girl and had not other parts
worth naming--absorbed her wholly, and the exquisite symphony was
no more to her than an annoying din which made it difficult to hear
her companion's compliments that were as sweet, heavy, and stale
as Mailard's chocolates, left a year on the shelves. Their mutual
giggle and chatter at last became so obtrusive that an old and
music-loving German turned his broad face towards them, and hissed
out the word "Hist!" with such vindictive force as to suggest that
all the winds had suddenly broken lose from the cave of Aeolus.
Ik Stanton, who had been watching Van Berg's perturbed, lowering
face, and the weak comedy at the adjacent table, was obviously much
amused, although he took pains to appear blind to it all and kept
his back, as far as possible, towards the young lady.
The German's "hist" had been so fierce as to be almost like a rap
from a policeman's club, and there was an enforced and temporary
suspension of the inane chatter.
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