he little blue-painted bed, with its faded red roses, would again stand
empty in the gloom of the Knapf attic.

Norberg glanced up quickly as I entered the city room. "Get something
good on that south side story?" he asked.

"Why, no," I answered. "You were mistaken about that. The--the nice old
maid is not going to move, after all."

CHAPTER XV. FAREWELL TO KNAPFS

Consternation has corrugated the brows of the aborigines. Consternation
twice confounded had added a wrinkle or two to my collection. We are
homeless. That is, we are Knapfless--we, to whom the Knapfs spelled
home.

Herr Knapf, mustache aquiver, and Frau Knapf, cheek bones glistening,
broke the news to us one evening just a week after the exciting day
which so changed Bennie's life. "Es thut uns sehr, sehr leid," Herr
Knapf had begun. And before he had finished, protesting German groans
mingled with voluble German explanations. The aborigines were stricken
down. They clapped pudgy fists to knobby foreheads; they smote their
breasts, and made wild gestures with their arms. If my protests were
less frenzied than theirs, it was only because my knowledge of German
stops at words of six syllables.

Out of the chaos of ejaculations and interrogation the reason for our
expulsion at last was made clear. The little German hotel had not been
remunerative. Our host and hostess were too hospitable and too polite to
state the true reason for this state of affairs. Perhaps rents were
too high. Perhaps, thought I, Frau Knapf had been too liberal with the
butter in the stewed chicken. Perhaps there had been too many golden
Pfannkuchen with real eggs and milk stirred into them, and with
toothsome little islands of ruddy currant jelly on top. Perhaps there
had been too much honest, nourishing food, and not enough boarding-house
victuals. At any rate, the enterprise would have to be abandoned.

It was then that the bare, bright little dining room, with its queer
prints of chin-chucking lieutenants, and its queerer faces, and its
German cookery became very dear to me. I had grown to like Frau Knapf,
of the shining cheek bones, and Herr Knapf, of the heavy geniality. A
close bond of friendship had sprung up between Frau Nirlanger and me. I
would miss her friendly visits, and her pretty ways, and her
sparkling conversation. She and I had held many kimonoed pow-wows, and
sometimes--not often--she had given me wonderful glimpses of that which
she had left--of Vienna,