Page:Karl Gjellerup - Minna, A novel - 1913.djvu/272

 of me, before she asked Stephensen to draw one of himself for her, so she did not once allow either one of us to get anything at the cost of the other; even if she employed a little art and calculation in this impartiality, she used still more natural feeling and instinctive tact. She talked to both of us—the subject of conversation was the German Theatre and Dramatic Art—but as she was being drawn half-profile, she could seldom look towards Stephensen, and even when she answered him her eyes and attention seemed to be fixed upon me. He was very much occupied by his work, but liked her to talk so that her face might retain its liveliness.

Only when he drew the important part round the mouth she was to sit silent, and she then made her mother praise the old days at the theatre. Truly enough it did not appear that Mrs. Jagemann had often visited the theatre, but she had been captivated by Devrient, whom she had, however, seen more in her father's restaurant than on the stage; and what she had heard from others, who had more idea of art, was so mingled in her rather muddled brain with the little she remembered herself that she grew just as sentimental as if she had lived and breathed in the temple of Thalia and Melpomene.

"Oh dear me, yes, in those days we had artists! You ought to have seen our theatres then, Mr. Stephensen! Davison! surely you have heard of him? You know the beautiful villa which he built, just opposite the Bohemian railway station; in those days it was something new, we have so many others now. Yes, he made a lot out of it, but it was also worth the money to see him. As Mephistopheles, terrifying! Now I would not dare to see it for anything. But at last he also went off his head, you know. And Emil Devrient, that was in quite a different way,