“No, it’s my first visit to Baireuth,” he said, “and I can’t tell you how excited I am about it.  I’ve been looking forward to it so much that I almost expect to be disappointed.”

Falbe blew out a cloud of smoke and laughter.

“Oh, you’re safe enough,” he said.  “Baireuth never disappoints.  It’s one of the facts—­a reliable fact.  And Munich?  Do you go to Munich afterwards?”

“Yes.  I hope so.”

Falbe clicked with his tongue

“Lucky fellow,” he said.  “How I wish I was.  But I’ve got to get back again after my week.  You’ll spend the mornings in the galleries, and the afternoons and evenings at the opera.  O Lord, Munich!”

He came across from the other side of the carriage and sat next Michael, putting his feet up on the seat opposite.

“Talk of Munich,” he said.  “I was born in Munich, and I happen to know that it’s the heavenly Jerusalem, neither more nor less.”

“Well, the heavenly Jerusalem is practically next door to Baireuth,” said Michael.

“I know; but it can’t be managed.  However, there’s a week of unalloyed bliss between me now and the desolation of London in August.  What is so maddening is to think of all the people who could go to Munich and don’t.”

Michael held debate within himself.  He felt that he ought to tell his new acquaintance that he knew who he was, that, however trivial their conversation might be, it somehow resembled eavesdropping to talk to a chance fellow-passenger as if he were a complete stranger.  But it required again a certain effort to make the announcement.

“I think I had better tell you,” he said at length, “that I know you, that I’ve listened to you at least, at your sister’s recital a few days ago.”

Falbe turned to him with the friendliest pleasure.

“Ah! were you there?” he asked.  “I hope you listened to her, then, not to me.  She sang well, didn’t she?”

“But divinely.  At the same time I did listen to you, especially in the French songs.  There was less song, you know.”

Falbe laughed.

“And more accompaniment!” he said.  “Perhaps you play?”

Michael was seized with a fit of shyness at the idea of talking to Falbe about himself.

“Oh, I just strum,” he said.

Throughout the journey their acquaintanceship ripened; and casually, in dropped remarks, the two began to learn something about each other.  Falbe’s command of English, as well as his sister’s, which was so complete that it was impossible to believe that a foreigner was speaking, was explained, for it came out that his mother was English, and that from infancy they had spoken German and English indiscriminately.  His father, who had died some dozen years before, had been a singer of some note in his native land, but was distinguished more for his teaching than his practice, and it was he who had taught his daughter.  Hermann Falbe himself had always intended to be a pianist, but the poverty in which they were left at his father’s death had obliged him to give lessons rather than devote himself to his own career; but now at the age of thirty he found himself within sight of the competence that would allow him to cut down his pupils, and begin to be a pupil again himself.