He straightened under it.  He knew the old city fairly well—­enough to love it and to loathe it in one breath.  He had seen its tragedies and passed them by, or had, in his haphazard way, thrown a greeting to them, or even a glass of native wine.  And he knew the musical temperament; the all or nothing of its insistent demands; its heights that are higher than others, its wretchednesses that are hell.  Once in the Hofstadt Theater, where he had bought standing room, he had seen a girl he had known in Berlin, where he was taking clinics and where she was cooking her own meals.  She had been studying singing.  In the Hofstadt Theater she had worn a sable coat and had avoided his eyes.

Perhaps the old coffee-house had seen nothing more absurd, in its years of coffee and billiards and Munchener beer, than Peter’s new resolution that night:  this poverty adopting poverty, this youth adopting youth, with the altruistic purpose of saving it from itself.

And this, mind you, before Peter Byrne had heard Harmony’s story or knew her name, Rosa having called her “The Beautiful One” in her narrative, and the delicatessen-seller being literal in his repetition.

Back to “The Beautiful One” went Peter Byrne, and, true to his new part of protector and guardian, squared his shoulders and tried to look much older than he really was, and responsible.  The result was a grimness that alarmed Harmony back to the forgotten proprieties.

“I think I must go,” she said hurriedly, after a glance at his determinedly altruistic profile.  “I must finish packing my things.  The Portier has promised—­”

“Go!  Why, you haven’t even told me your name!”

“Frau Schwarz will present you to-night,” primly and rising.

Peter Byrne rose, too.

“I am going back with you.  You should not go through that lonely yard alone after dark.”

“Yard!  How do you know that?”

Byrne was picking up the cheese, which he had thoughtlessly set on the heater, and which proved to be in an alarming state of dissolution.  It took a moment to rewrap, and incidentally furnished an inspiration.  He indicated it airily.

“Saw you this morning coming out—­delicatessen shop across the street,” he said glibly.  And then, in an outburst of honesty which the girl’s eyes seemed somehow to compel:  “That’s true, but it’s not all the truth.  I was on the bus last night, and when you got off alone I—­I saw you were an American, and that’s not a good neighborhood.  I took the liberty of following you to your gate!”

He need not have been alarmed.  Harmony was only grateful, and said so.  And in her gratitude she made no objection to his suggestion that he see her safely to the old lodge and help her carry her hand-luggage and her violin to the pension.  He paid the trifling score, and followed by many eyes in the room they went out into the crisp night together.