Lisa's attention hadn't been lost on others in the audience. People pointed to her from the main audience floor and the other boxes, they murmured to each other, leaning and turning to look at her, and tiny opera glasses came out of glittering handbags to focus on her. The old couple in the box was walking to the tiny aisle in the center of the box when Janice turned, and they smiled and bowed to her. Janice returned the salutation and motioned them ahead of her, touching off more bows. She followed them up the steps to the door. There was a tall, powerfully built usher waiting just outside the door, the deep saber scar down his cheek standing in bold relief in his granite face, frozen in teutonic rigidity.
"Fraulein Vy-cliff-eh?"
Others turned to look, and Janice almost jumped from the ringing sound of his voice. She turned and looked up at him. "Ja?"
He bowed and clicked his heels together sharply. "Kommen sie mit, bille."
CHAPTER FOUR
It was late, very late, and the utter quietness had the hushed quality of the frozen static hours of early morning. They were both tired and sleepy but still awake in the relaxed somnolence of lovers who are reluctant to abandon their nearness for the small death of sleep. Celia smiled drowsily at Janice and spoke softly. "You lapse into German about half the time, dearest, and I can't understand you. What did the usher say?"
Janice smiled tiredly, still looking up at the ceiling. "Do I? I didn't notice, darling. There was a time when German was… well, that's later. He told me to follow him…"
The corridor behind the stage leading to the dressing rooms was an utter bedlam. It seemed that half the audience had somehow managed to get into it, and in the midst of them workers were struggling back and forth, flowers were being delivered, and musicians were trying to get through. The hubub of noise swelled in her ears as she followed the usher into the crowd. He glanced over his shoulder at her, frowning thoughtfully, then he put his arm around her shoulders and pulled her close to him as he began backing into the crowd, forcing a path for them with his brawny shoulders. He smelled faintly of beer, tobacco, and sweat as Janice was crushed against him, and she gripped his lapels and shuffled her feet rapidly to keep up with him as he pushed through the crowd.
It was absolutely jammed as they approached Lisa's dressing room. Tall, paunchy, red-faced men, in cutaways and women in evening clothes were chattering to each other, apparently oblivious of the pushes and shoves which surged them from side to side and crushed them together. There were shouts of a couple of policemen trying to clear the corridor, but the normally disciplined, authority conscious Austrians were completely ignoring them in the continuing excitement of the moment. The usher began to struggle harder, and his arm tightened around Janice. She was dragged for the last few feet, then the usher finally levered her around in front of a door and planted his massive body between her and the crowd in the corridor, placing his hands on the door jamb and pushing back to make a few inches of room for her. She suddenly had breathing space between the door and the wide wall of his uniform in front of her, and he pounded on the door imperiously with his fist. Over the deafening noise in the corridor there was a faint sound of a voice from the other side of the door. "Fraulein Vy-cliff-eh!" the usher bellowed at the top of his voice. A key rattled in the door and it opened a crack as he braced his hands harder against the doorframe to keep the surging masses back from the door, then it opened, Janice was snatched inside, and the door slammed behind her.
The room seemed calm and peaceful after the uproar of the hall and the jammed bedlam of the corridor. The woman who had snatched her inside was a large, buxom, red-faced woman who had a harassed expression on her face as she turned the key in the door again. There were trunks and suitcases scattered around the room, some of them standing open, and the woman was holding a long, velvet evening dress in her free hand. She pointed to the door on the other side of the room and told Janice in broken, French-accented German to go through it. Janice could hear a murmur of conversation as she approached the door. Another workwoman was puttering with the cosmetics on the table in front of the massive mirror along one wall, and Lisa was lounging on a couch on the other side of the room. She pushed herself up from the couch and walked toward Janice, smiling and holding out her arms.
They fit perfectly, beautifully. Janice's lips were even with the white throat, Lisa's breasts were against her shoulders, her arms slid naturally around Lisa's waist, and Lisa's arms went effortlessly around her shoulders as her lips touched her hair. Not a trace of awkwardness or groping, and Janice felt enfolded, enveloped as her lips buried in the moist silkiness of Lisa's smooth, fragrant throat. Lisa was moist and warm, white and soft, and there was a faint, underlying hint of perspiration which blended intoxicatingly with her perfume. Lisa's dress swept sharply down in the back, baring her almost to her waist, and Janice's hands clutched greedily at her smooth skin as she tingled from the resilient feel of Lisa's breasts against her.
Then Lisa was effortlessly out of her arms and was leading her toward the couch by her hand as she told the workwoman to see if her bath was ready. The woman disappeared through a door, nodding, and Lisa sat down on the couch and pulled Janice down beside her.
"And school was less difficult for you today, little darling?"
"Lisa, I thought I was losing my mind. I couldn't understand why everyone was being so considerate, and then when I saw you coming onto the stage…"
"You weren't unhappy with me were you, little darling? Angry that I did what I did without asking you first?"
The German seemed to be singing in her head, coming to her effortlessly. "How could I be angry with you? But I was astonished. When I realized who you were, I was surprised beyond measure that you spent so much time with me last night and went to so much effort in my behalf."
"You were so unhappy, little darling. And I must confess that there was nothing wrong with my watch. I'd seen you before in the hallway, and then I passed your door and heard you crying…" She broke off and looked at the workwoman who came back in and rattled a sentence which sounded like French but wasn't. She patted Janice's hand as she stood up. "Wait for me a few minutes, and then we shall go to dinner together, little darling. Would you do me that courtesy?"
"I am delighted beyond measure."
Lisa gave her the breathtaking smile as she went through the door and disappeared, and Janice sat back on the couch. The excitement bubbling within her seemed to be a small, joyous thing with a life of its own, dancing and singing inside her, and she shivered as she clenched her hands together on her lap.
The other workwoman came in from the other room, and the two women moved a couple of large suitcases into the other room. Janice noticed the letters stenciled on one of them. "Grevenburg – Symphonique Bruxelles." Then realization of the obvious dawned on her with a stabbing pain of disappointment. Lisa was a guest conductress and the women were chatting in Flemish. Lisa was from Brussels. And apparently her luggage had already been brought from the rooming house. The mountain of hopeful expectations which had yet to be completely defined in concrete images suddenly collapsed within her.
Lisa came back in from the bathroom, adjusting her dress; she had changed into a street dress, a light-colored woven wool which hugged the full curves of her slender body. She smiled at Janice as she leaned over in front of the mirror to put on lipstick and touch her face with powder, and her smile disappeared as she looked at Janice more closely. "Is there something wrong, little darling? Are you unhappy about something?"
"I just realized you weren't from Vienna you'll be leaving here."