Now, out with it!"
"Well, I was a year at Heidelberg, you know, and a fellow there told me
that one evening, in a cafe at Temesvar, a student kicked up a shindy
by singing that song. In less than a minute an officer had been
stabbed with his own sword, and a policeman shot, and it took a
squadron of cavalry to clear the street. He learnt the blessed ditty,
out of sheer curiosity, and I picked it up from him."
"What is it all about?"
"I don't know. I believe it tells the Austrians their real name, but I
couldn't translate a line of it to save my life."
Curtis leaned back in the car and laughed.
"You are by way of being a genius," he said. "I have seen a crowd go
stark, staring mad because some idiot waved a black flag, but that was
a symbol of the Boxer rebellion, and it meant something. In this
instance, among people so far away from their own country, one would
hardly expect----"
He broke off suddenly, and leaned forward.
The car had just entered Madison Square, at the junction of Broadway
and Fifth Avenue, south of 23rd Street. A Columbus Avenue street-car
had halted to allow traffic to pass, and a gray automobile which was
coming out of Fifth Avenue had been held up by a policeman stationed
there. Curtis's attention was caught by the color and shape of the
vehicle, and in the flood of light cast by the powerful lamps and
brilliant electric devices concentrated on that important crossing, he
obtained a vivid glimpse of the chauffeur's face.
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