第35章

This was to be followed by a sketch of the Judgment of Paris, in which Juno and Pallas were to be personated by two young men, and Miss Anderson took the part of Venus.

The pretty drawing-room of the Trevors--young people from Albany, and cousins of Miss Anderson--was curtained off at one end for a stage, and beyond the sliding doors which divided it in half were set chairs for the spectators. People had come in whatever dress they liked; the men were mostly in morning coats; the ladies had generally made some attempt at evening toilet, but they joined in admiring Alice Pasmer's costume, and one of them said that they would let it represent them all, and express what each might have done if she would. There was not much time for their tributes; all the lamps were presently taken away and set along the floor in front of the curtain as foot-lights, leaving the company in a darkness which Mrs. Brinkley pronounced sepulchral. She made her reproaches to the master of the house, who had effected this transposition of the lamps. "I was just thinking some very pretty and valuable things about your charming cottage, Mr. Trevor: a rug on a bare floor, a trim of varnished pine, a wall with half a dozen simple etchings on it, an open fire, and a mantelpiece without bric-a-brac, how entirely satisfying it all is! And how it upbraids us for heaping up upholstery as we do in town!""Go on," said the host. "Those are beautiful thoughts.""But I can't go on in the dark," retorted Mrs. Brinkley. "You can't think in the dark, much less talk! Can you, Mrs. Pasmer?" Mrs. Pasmer, with Alice next to her, sat just in front of Mrs. Brinkley.

"No," she assented; "but if I could--YOU can thick anywhere, Mrs.

Brinkley--Mrs. Trevor's lovely house would inspire me to it.""Two birds with one stone--thank you, Mrs. Pasmer, for my part of the compliment. Pick yourself up, Mr. Trevor.""Oh, thank you, I'm all right," said Trevor, panting after the ladies'

meanings, as a man must. "I suppose thinking and talking in the dark is a good deal like smoking in the dark.""No; thinking and talking are not at all like smoking under any conditions. Why in the world should they be?""Oh, I can't get any fun out of a cigar unless I can see the smoke," the host explained.

"Do you follow him, Mrs. Pasmer?"

"Yes, perfectly."

"Thank you, Mrs. Pasmer," said Trevor.

"I'll get you to tell me how you did it some time," said Mrs. Brinkley.

"But your house is a gem, Mr. Trevor."

"Isn't it?" cried Trevor. "I want my wife to live here the year round."It was the Trevors' first summer in their cottage, and the experienced reader will easily recognise his mood. "But she's such a worldly spirit, she won't.""Oh, I don't know about the year round. Do you, Mrs. Pasmer?""I should," said Alice, with the suddenness of youth, breaking into the talk which she had not been supposed to take any interest in.

"Is it proper to kiss a young lady's hand?" said Trevor gratefully, appealing to Mrs. Brinkley.

"It isn't very customary in the nineteenth century," said Mrs. Brinkley.

"But you might kiss her fan. He might kiss her fan, mightn't he, Mrs.

Pasmer?"

"Certainly. Alice, hold out your fan instantly."The girl humoured the joke, laughing.

Trevor pressed his lips to the perfumed sticks. "I will tell Mrs.

Trevor," he said, "and that will decide her.""It will decide her not to come here at all next year if you tell her all.""He never tells me all," said Mrs. Trevor, catching so much of the talk as she came in from some hospitable cares in the dining-room. "They're incapable of it. What has he been doing now?""Nothing. Or I will tell you when we are alone, Mrs. Trevor," said Mrs.

Brinkley, with burlesque sympathy. "We oughtn't to have a scene on both sides of the foot-lights."A boyish face, all excitement, was thrust out between the curtains forming the proscenium of the little theatre. "All ready, Mrs. Trevor?""Yes, all ready, Jim."

He dashed the curtains apart, and marred the effect of his own disappearance from the scene by tripping over the long legs of Jove, stretched out to the front, where he sat on Mrs. Trevor's richest rug, propped with sofa cushions on either hand.

"So perish all the impious race of titans, enemies of the gods!" said Mavering solemnly, as the boy fell sprawling. "Pick the earth-born giant up, Vulcan, my son."The boy was very small for his age; every one saw that the accident had not been premeditated, and when Vulcan appeared, with an exaggerated limp, and carried the boy off, a burst of laughter went up from the company.

It did not matter what the play was to have been after that; it all turned upon the accident. Juno came on, and began to reproach Jupiter for his carelessness. "I've sent Mercury upstairs for the aynica; but he says it's no use: that boy won't be able to pass ball for a week. How often have I told you not to sit with your feet out that way! I knew you'd hurt somebody.""I didn't have my feet out," retorted Jupiter. "Besides," he added, with dignity, and a burlesque of marital special pleading which every wife and husband recognised, "I always sit with my feet out so, and I always will, so long as I've the spirit of a god.""Isn't he delicious?" buzzed Mrs. Pasmer, leaning backward to whisper to Mrs. Brinkley; it was not that she thought what Dan had just said was so very fanny, but people are immoderately applausive of amateur dramatics, and she was feeling very fond of the young fellow.

The improvisation went wildly and adventurously on, and the curtains dropped together amidst the facile acclaim of the audience: