The people of Eschenbach were astonished. “Where did the child come from?” they asked. “Who is its mother? Who is its father?” The records in the office of the registrar of births showed that Meta Steinhäger was the mother of the illegitimate child, Eva Steinhäger, and that its father was unknown. It was to be presumed, however, that widow Nothafft knew the details. The old women, and the young ones too, came on this account more frequently now than ever to her shop. They wanted to know how the little thing was getting along, whether its milk agreed with it, whether it had begun to teethe, whether it would speak German or some foreign tongue, and so on. In order to quiet them, Marian told them that Meta was a poor relative and that she was bringing up the child at her own expense. It was not difficult to make this story seem plausible, for Meta had very little to do with her daughter. Shortly after her confinement, she got a job with a baker over in Dinkelsbühl, and never visited Eva more than once a month. She cared very little for the child. A young fellow in the bakery had fallen in love with Meta, and wanted to marry her and move to America. At Christmas they were married, and left the country at once. Marian was glad of it: the child now belonged entirely to her. Though the people soon became accustomed to the existence of their diminutive fellow-townswoman, Eva was and remained the mysterious child of Eschenbach. IX The opera company made its rounds through the small cities that lie between the Danube and the Main, the Saale and the Neckar—and there are many of them,—its stay in any one place depending naturally on the interest shown by the public. “The province is the enchanted Sleeping Beauty,” said the impresario Dörmaul to Wurzelmann and Daniel, “the province is still asleep, and you must rouse it from its slumbers by pressing the kiss of the Muse on its forehead.” But the impresario was unwilling to open his pockets. The princes who were to release Sleeping Beauty did not have sufficient means to make a presentable appearance, while their retinue was seedy-looking indeed. The tenor had long since passed the zenith of his career. His massive paunch placed deadening strictures on his credentials as the impersonator of heroes. The buffo was an inveterate toper who had often been placed behind bars by the police for his nocturnal excesses. The barytone had a big lawsuit on his hands about an estate; his lawyers were two stars of obscurity from a small village; and at times he became so vexed at the cuts of his opponents that he lost his voice. The soprano was incessantly quarrelling with her colleagues, and the alto was an intriguing vixen quite without talent. In addition to these there were a dozen or so super-numeraries and under-studies, who were bored, who played practical jokes on each other, drew starvation wages, and had never learned anything.