“Never heard a word,” said Steindal, who seemed to accept Karl’s presence with greater complacency each moment. “That is to say, I knew he was worried about some girl. As if any woman were worth suicide! _Sango la Madonna!_” “That is more like the Steindal of old, though the appeal is to a strange patroness,” cried Karl. “Oh, do not worry, Jules! Give us fish, flesh, and fowl, and bring the best wine of France. We leave details to you.” The head waiter whisked off. That sort of order is comprehensible. The diner surrenders at discretion, no matter what the charge. “Your references to past acquaintance puzzle me,” said the Jew, politely keeping to the thread of the conversation. “Then I must be mistaken. Perhaps Constantine gave me a picture so vivid that it burnt itself into my memory.” “That is a popular attribute of the fiend, and hardly flattering to me,” laughed the other. “Well, there is some truth in it, and it may even contain a germ of adulation. Unless I err again, you played Mephisto to Constantine’s Faust, eh?” “Very likely. I knew many Margarets in those days.” I expected an explosion after that singularly apt, yet unfortunate, reply, but, beyond a slight contraction of the eyelids and twitching of the nostrils, Karl gave no sign. Steindal was so unctuously candid, so shielded by the armor of money and conceit, that I deemed him impenetrable by the hidden lightning with which Karl was enveloping him. I changed my opinion ere many minutes passed. “Many Margarets,” repeated Karl, musingly, “and many Fausts, but only one devil, Steindal.” “Do you think so? Then he exists in numerous forms. _Sapristi!_ Here is another and familiar imp in a _sole diable_. And an ’84 champagne! You can’t get this wine in Paris.” Steindal had that insufferable habit of tucking a napkin under his chin. He began to eat. He swallowed two glasses of wine with surprising haste. Karl relapsed into silence. Hooper and I spoke of generalities. An orchestra was tuning up, and Karl whispered to a waiter. I saw that the conductor held a confabulation with the bassoon-player, and the band struck into an allegro movement which I did not recognize at once. Suddenly Karl leaned forward. His eyes blazed with fire. Had the hotel clerk of former years been in the room he would have remembered that look. “That is your cue, Mephisto,” he said, his low-pitched voice vibrating with intense energy. “Up you get! On the chair! You know the words: Dio dell’ or del mondo, signor, Sei possente risplendente Culto hai tu maggior quaggiù. That’s it! Now!” And Steindal, skipping to his feet, mounted the chair with surprising agility, and began to sing, with a fine assumption of the basso profundo manner, the rollicking song with which Mephistopheles disturbed the village revels. What could be more amazing than the action, more appropriate than the air? It has been rendered in English: