schaikowsky, op. 47, A, B, C, D, E, F, G. I
listened: I didn't understand it all, but I was sitting next to Edith
and would have endured the remainder of the alphabet rather than let
Tompkins gain one point.

The piano thundered and roared; lightning flew over the keys, and we
were of course electrified. Herr Wunderheim jammed the notes in an
astounding manner, and when he reached the letter G the sporting man
said to me in a pious whisper, "Thank God! we didn't go to
H---- altogether, but near it, my boy, near it!" I shrugged my shoulders
and longed for my club.

Mighty was the applause. Herr Wunderheim looked delighted. Mrs.
Wegstaffe, sailing up to the distinguished Bulgarian pianist, said
loudly:

"Dear Herr Wunderheim, charmed, I assure you! We are all charmed; dear
Tschaikowsky, charming man, charming composer. Dear Walter Damrosch
assured me that he was quite the gentleman; charming music altogether!"

The pianist grew red in the face. Then, straightening himself quite
suddenly, he said in tones that sounded like a dog barking:

"Dot vasn't Schykufski I blayed, lieber madame; dot vas a koprice by me,
myself."

Even the second drawing-room people stopped talking for a minute....

The musicale merrily proceeded. We heard the amateur tenor with the
cravat voice. We heard the society pianist, who had a graceful bow and
an amiable technic; then two of Frau Makart's pupils sang. I couldn't
get near the Italian contingent, but they chattered loudly. One of the
girls sang Dvo[vr]ak's "Gute Nacht," and her German made me shiver. The
other tried a Brahms song and everybody talked. I turned to ask Edith
the girl's name but she had gone--so had Tompkins.

This angered me but I couldn't get up then. Opposite me was a Yankee
college professor--an expert on golfing poetry--who had become famous by
an essay in which he proved that Poe should not have written Poe; next
to me sat a fat lady who said to her daughter as she fanned herself
vigorously, "Horrid music, that Brahms. He wrote 'The Rustic Cavalier,'
didn't he? And some nasty critics said it was written by De----"

"No, mamma. He wrote--" more buzzing and I fled upstairs.

The men's room was crowded to suffocation. Everybody was drinking hard,
and old Wegstaffe was telling a story to a group of young men among whom
I recognized the fat author of that affected book "How to play Chopin
though Happy." He was pretty far gone.

"Shee here, bhoys; thish bloody music-