PAPPELMEISTER No, but de Christian had--he get de same--I mean salary, ha! ha! ha! not children. Den he can be independent--vedder de fool-public like his American symphony or not--_nicht wahr?_ VERA You _are_ good to us---- [_Hastily correcting herself_] to Mr. Quixano. PAPPELMEISTER [_Smiling_] And aldough you cannot broduce him, I broduce his symphony. _Was?_ VERA Oh, Herr Pappelmeister! You are an angel. PAPPELMEISTER _Nein, nein, mein liebes Kind!_ I fear I haf not de correct shape for an angel. [_He laughs heartily. A knock at the door from the hall._] VERA [_Merrily_] _Now_ I clap my hands. [_She claps._] Come! [_The door opens._] Behold him! [_She makes a conjurer's gesture. DAVID, bare-headed, carrying his fiddle, opens the door, and stands staring in amazement at PAPPELMEISTER._] DAVID I thought you asked me to meet your father. PAPPELMEISTER She is a magician. She has changed us. [_He waves his umbrella._] Hey presto, _was_? Ha! Ha! Ha! [_He goes to DAVID, and shakes hands._] _Und wie geht's?_ I hear you've left home. DAVID Yes, but I've such a bully cabin---- PAPPELMEISTER [_Alarmed_] You are sailing avay? VERA [_Laughing_] No, no--that's only his way of describing his two-dollar-a-month garret. DAVID Yes--my state-room on the top deck! VERA [_Smiling_] Six foot square. DAVID But three other passengers aren't squeezed in, and it never pitches and tosses. It's heavenly. PAPPELMEISTER [_Smiling_] And from heaven you flew down to blay in dat beer-hall. _Was?_ [_DAVID looks surprised._] _I_ heard you. DAVID You! What on earth did you go _there_ for? PAPPELMEISTER Vat on earth does one go to a beer-hall for? Ha! Ha! Ha! For vawter! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ven I hear you blay, I dink mit myself--if my blans succeed and I get Carnegie Hall for Saturday Symphony Concerts, dat boy shall be one of my first violins. _Was?_ [_He slaps DAVID on the left shoulder._] DAVID [_Overwhelmed, ecstatic, yet wincing a little at the slap on his wound._] Be one of your first---- [_Remembering_] Oh, but it is impossible. VERA [_Alarmed_] Mr. Quixano! You must not refuse. DAVID But does Herr Pappelmeister know about the wound in my shoulder? PAPPELMEISTER [_Agitated_] You haf been vounded? DAVID Only a legacy from Russia--but it twinges in some weathers. PAPPELMEISTER And de pain ubsets your blaying? DAVID Not so much the pain--it's all the dreadful memories-- VERA [_Alarmed_] Don't talk of them. DAVID I _must_ explain to Herr Pappelmeister--it wouldn't be fair. Even now [_Shuddering_] there comes up before me the bleeding body of my mother, the cold, fiendish face of the Russian officer, supervising the slaughter---- VERA Hush! Hush! DAVID [_Hysterically_] Oh, that butcher's face--there it is--hovering in the air, that narrow, fanatical forehead, that----