Part 13 (1/2)

The woman looked at me with a puzzled frown, but did not answer. Then, as I started toward her with outstretched arms, she turned and fled into the shadows, leaving with me nothing but the echo of her laughter, the softest, sweetest laughter! I made no effort to follow her, because I was not quite sure that I had seen anything.

”Moonlight!” I laughed discordantly.

Phyllis in this deserted place? I saw how impossible that was. I had been dreaming. The spirit of some wood-nymph had visited me, and for a brief s.p.a.ce had borrowed the features of the woman I loved. In vain I searched the grove. The vision was nowhere to be found. I went back to the inn somewhat shaken up.

Several old veterans were seated in the barroom, smoking bad tobacco and drinking a final bout. Their jargon was unintelligible to me.

”Where's your barmaid?” I asked of the inn-keeper.

His faded blue eyes scanned me sharply. I read a question in them and wondered.

”She went into the garden to get a breath of fresh air,” he said. ”She does not like the smoke.”

It annoyed me. I had seen some one, then. What would Phyllis, proud Phyllis, say, I mused, when she heard that a barmaid was her prototype?

This thought had scarcely left me when the door in the rear of the bar opened and in came the barmaid herself. No, it was not Phyllis, but the resemblance was so startling that I caught my breath and stared at her with a persistency which bordered on rudeness. The barmaid was blonde, whereas Phyllis was neither blonde nor brunette, but stood between the extremes, and there was a difference in the eyes: I could see that even in the insufficient light.

”Good evening, fraulein,” said I, with apparent composure. ”And what might your name be?”

”It is Gretchen, if it please you,” with a courtesy. I had a vague idea that this courtesy was made mockingly.

”Gretchen? I have heard the name before,” said I, ”and you remind me of some one I have seen.”

”Herr has been to the great city?”

B---- is the greatest city in the world to the provincial.

”Yes,” said I; ”but you remind me of no one I ever saw there.”

She plucked a leaf from the rose she wore and began nibbling at it.

Her mouth was smaller than the one belonging to Phyllis.

”The person to whom I refer,” I went on, ”lives in America, where your compatriots brew fine beer and wax rich.”

”Ah, Herr is an American? I like Americans,” archly. ”They are so liberal.”

I laughed, but I did not tell her why. All foreigners have a great love of Americans--”They are so liberal.”

”So you find Americans liberal? Is it with money or with compliments?”

Said Gretchen: ”The one when they haven't the other.”

A very bright barmaid, thought I.

Then I said: ”Is this your home?”

”Yes,” said Gretchen. ”I was born here and I have tended the roses for ever so long.”

”I have heard of Gretchen of the steins, but I never before heard of a Gretchen of the roses.”

”Herr must have a large store of compliments on hand to begin this early.”