“Play! It isn’t a play.” “Why, you young idiot, you said it was good! You said it was darn good! You don’t mean to tell me--” “Oh, that! That’s all right. It’s good--or will be when you get through with it.” “What you talking about then? Here, let’s take one of these things with two horses. Gee, you ought to smoke a fat black seegar and wear a silk hat when you ride in one of these! I feel like a parade.” He was like a boy on a holiday. “But let me tell you about this girl, won’t you!” “Oh, it’s a girl! What’s her name? What’s she do?” “Her name’s Mizzi.” “Mizzi what?” “I don’t know. She’s a hod-carrier. She--” “That’s all right, Wallie. I’m here now. An ice bag on your head and real quiet for two or three days. You’ll come around fine.” But Wallie was almost sulking. “Wait till you see her, S. H. She sings.” “Beautiful, is she?” “No, not particularly. No.” “Wonderful voice, h’m?” “N-n-no. I wouldn’t say it was what you’d call exactly wonderful.” Sid Hahn stood up in the droshky and waved his short arms in windmill circles. “Well, what the devil does she do then, that’s so good! Carry bricks?” “She _is_ good at that. When she balances that pail of mortar on her head and walks off with it, her arms hanging straight at her sides--” But Sid Hahn’s patience was at an end. “You’re a humorist, you are. If I didn’t know you I’d say you were drunk. I’ll bet you are, anyway. You’ve been eating paprika, raw. You make me sick.” Inelegant, but expressive of his feelings. But Wallie only said, “You wait. You’ll see.” Sid Hahn did see. He saw next day. Wallie woke him out of a sound sleep so that he might see. It was ten-thirty a. m. so that his peevishness was unwarranted. They had seen the play the night before and Hahn had decided that translated and with interpolations (it was a comic opera) it would captivate New York. Then and there he completed the negotiations which Wallie had begun. Hahn was all for taking the first train out, but Wallie was firm. “You’ve got to see her, I tell you. You’ve got to see her.” Their hotel faced the Corso. The Corso is a wide promenade that runs along the Buda bank of the Danube. Across the river, on the hill, the royal palace looks down upon the little common people. In the day the monde and the demi-monde of Budapest walked on the Corso between twelve and one. Up and down. Up and down. The women, tall, dark, flashing-eyed, daringly dressed. The men sallow, meager, and wearing those trousers which, cut very wide and flappy at the ankles, make them the dowdiest men in the world. Hahn’s room and Wallie’s were on the second floor of the hotel, and at a corner. One set of windows faced the Corso, the river, and Pest on the hill. The other set looked down upon a new building being erected across the way. It was on this building that Mizzi Markis worked as hod-carrier.