When, later that same day, Petite Jeanne started away, bent on the joyous business of returning a lost cameo to a dear old lady, she expected to come upon no fresh mystery.
“Certainly,” she said to Florence, who, because of her work, could not accompany her, “in the bright light of day one experiences no thrills.” Surprise came to her all the same.
She had reached the very street crossing at which she was to alight before she realized that the address the little old lady had given was in Chinatown.
“Surprise number one,” she murmured. “A white lady living in Chinatown. I can’t be wrong, for just over there is the temple where I saw the magic curtain.” If other evidence were lacking, she had only to glance at the pedestrians on the street. Nine out of every ten were Chinese.
For a moment she stood quite still upon the curb. Perhaps her experience on that other occasion had inspired an unwarranted fear.
“For shame!” She stamped her small foot. “This is broad day! Why be afraid?”
Surprise number two came to her upon arriving at the gate of the place she sought. No dingy tenement this. The cutest little house, set at the back of a tiny square of green grass, flanked a curious rock garden where water sparkled. The whole affair seemed to have been lifted quite complete from some Chinese fairy book.
“It’s the wrong address.” Her spirits drooped a little.
But no. One bang at the gong that hung just outside the door, and the little old lady herself was peeping through a narrow crack.
“Oh! It is you!” she exclaimed, throwing the door wide. “And you have my cameo!”
“Yes,” Jeanne smiled, “I have your cameo.”
Because she was French, Jeanne was not at all disturbed by the smothering caress she received from the old lady of this most curious house.
The next moment she was inside the house and sinking deep in a great heap of silky, downy pillows.
“But, my friend,” she exclaimed, as soon as she had caught her breath after a glance about the room where only Oriental objects, dragons, curious lanterns, silk banners, and thick mats were to be found, “this is Chinatown, and you are not Oriental!”
“No, my child. I am not.” The little lady’s eyes sparkled. “But for many years my father was Consul to China. I lived with him and came to know the Chinese people. I learned to love them for their gentleness, their simplicity, their kindness. They loved me too a little, I guess, for after my father died and I came to America, some rich Chinese merchants prepared this little house for me. And here I live.
“Oh, yes,” she sighed contentedly, “I do some translating for them and other little things, but I do not have a worry. They provide for me.
“But this!” She pressed the cameo to her lips. “This comes from another time, the long lost, beautiful past when I was a child with my father in Venice. That is why I prize it so. Can you blame me?”
“No! No!” The little French girl’s tone was deeply earnest. “I cannot. I, too, have lived long in Europe. France, my own beautiful France, was my childhood home.
“But tell me!” Her tone took on an excited note. “If you know so much of these mysterious Chinese, you can help me. Will you help me? Will you explain something?”
“If I can, my child. Gladly!”
“A few days ago,” the little French girl leaned forward eagerly, “I saw the most astonishing curtain. It burned, but was not consumed, like the burning bush.”
“You saw that?” It seemed that the little lady’s eyes would pop from her head. “You saw that? Where?”
“Over yonder.” Jeanne waved a hand. “In that Chinese temple.”
“I—did not—know it—was—here.” The little lady spoke very slowly.
“Then you have seen it!” In her eagerness Jeanne gripped the arms of her chair hard. “Tell me! What is it? How is it done? Could one borrow it?”
“Borrow it? My child, you do not know what you are asking!
“But you—” She lowered her voice to a shrill whisper. “How can you have seen it?”
Quite excitedly and with many a gesture, the little French girl told of her visit to the Chinese temple on that rainy afternoon.
“Oh, my child!” The little lady was all but in tears as she finished, tears of excitement and joy. “My dear child! You cannot know what you have done, nor how fortunate you are that you escaped unharmed.”
“But this is America, not China!” Jeanne’s tone showed her amazement.
“True, my child. But every great American city is many cities in one. On the streets you are safe. When you pry into the secrets of other people, that is quite another matter.”
“Secrets!”
“The Chinese people seem to be simple, kindly, harmless folks. So they are, on the street. But in their private dealings they are the most secretive people in the world.
“That temple you visited!” It was her turn to lean far forward. “That is more than a temple. It is a place of business, a chamber of commerce and the meeting place of the most powerful secret society the Chinese people have ever known, the Hop Sing Tong.”
“And that meeting, the magic curtain—” Jeanne’s eyes went wide.
“That was beyond doubt a secret meeting of the Tong. You came uninvited. Because of the darkness you escaped. You may thank Providence for that! But never, never do that again!”
“Then,” Jeanne’s tone was full of regret, “then I may never see the magic curtain again.”
“O, I wouldn’t say that.” The little lady smiled blandly. “Seeing the magic curtain and attending the meeting of a secret society are two different matters. The Chinese people are very kind to me. Some of the richest Chinese merchants—”
“Oh! Do you think you could arrange it? Do you think I might see it, two or three friends and I?”
“It might be arranged.”
“Will you try?”
“I will do my best.”
“And if it can be, will you let me know?” Jeanne rose to go.
“I will let you know.”
As Jeanne left the room, she found herself walking in a daze.
“And to think!” she whispered to herself, “that this little old lady and her lost cameo should so soon begin to fit into the marvelous pattern of my life.”
She had wonderful dreams, had this little French girl. She would see the magic curtain once more. With her on this occasion should be Marjory Dean, the great opera star, and her friend Angelo who wrote operas. When the magic curtain had been seen, an opera should be written around it, an Oriental opera full of mystery; a very short opera to be sure but an opera all the same.
“And perhaps!” Her feet sped away in a wild fling. “Perhaps I shall have a tiny part in that opera; a very tiny part indeed.”
The opera presented that night was Wagner’sDie Valkyre. To Petite Jeanne, the blithesome child of sunshine and song, it seemed a trifle heavy. For all this she was fascinated by the picture of life as it might have been lived long before man began writing his own history. And never before had she listened to such singing.
It was in the last great scene that a fresh hope for the future was borne in upon her. In the opera, Brunhilde having, contrary to the wishes of the gods, interceded for her lover Sigmund, she must be punished. She pleads her own cause in vain. At last she asks for a special punishment: that she be allowed to sleep encircled by fire until a hero of her people is found strong enough to rescue her.
Her wish is granted. Gently the god raises her and kisses her brow. Slowly she sinks upon the rock while tongues of flame leap from the rocks. Moment by moment the flames leap higher until the heroine is lost from sight.
It was at the very moment when the fires burned fiercest, the orchestra played its most amazing strains, that a great thought came to Jeanne.
“I will do it!” she cried aloud. “How wonderful that will be! We shall have an opera. The magic curtain; it shall be like this.”
Then, realizing that there were people close at hand, she clapped a hand to her lips and was silent.
A moment more and the strains of delectable music died away. Then it was that a man touched Jeanne’s arm.
“You are French.” The man had an unmistakable accent.
“Yes, monsieur.”
“I would like a word with you.”
“Yes, yes. If you will please wait here.” As Pierre, in a dress suit, Jeanne still had work to do.
Her head awhirl with her bright new idea, her eyes still seeing red from the fires that guarded Brunhilde, she hurried through with her humble tasks. Little wonder that she had forgotten the little Frenchman with the small beard. She started when he touched her arm.
“Pardon, my son. May I now have a word with you?”
She started at that word “son,” but quickly regained her poise.
“Surely you may.” She was at his command.
“I am looking,” he began at once, “for a little French girl named Petite Jeanne.”
“Pet—Petite!” The little French girl did not finish. She was trembling.
“Ah! Perhaps you know her.”
“No, no. Ah, yes, yes,” Jeanne answered in wild confusion.
“You will perhaps tell me where she lives. I have a very important message for her. I came from France to bring it.”
“From France?” Jeanne was half smothered with excitement. What should she do? Should she say: “I am Petite Jeanne?” Ah, no; she dared not. Then an inspiration came to her.
“You wish this person’s address? This Petite Jeanne?”
“If you will,” the man replied politely.
“Very well. I will write it down.”
Drawing a small silver pencil from her pocket with trembling fingers, she wrote an address upon the back of a program.
“There, monsieur. This is it.
“I think—” She shifted her feet uneasily. “I am sure she works rather late. If you were to call, perhaps in an hour, you might find her there.”
“So late as this?” The Frenchman raised his eyebrows.
“I am sure she would not mind.”
“Very well. I shall try. And a thousand thanks.” He pressed a coin in her unwilling hand. The next moment he had vanished.
“Gone!” she murmured, sinking into a seat. “Gone! And he had an important message for me! Oh! I must hurry home!”
Even as she spoke these words she detected a rustle at the back of the box. Having turned quickly about, she was just in time to see someone pass into the narrow aisle. It was the lady in black.
“I wonder if she heard?” Jeanne’s heart sank.
As she left the Opera House the little French girl’s spirits were low.
The lady in black frightened her. “What can she mean, always dogging my footsteps?” she asked herself as she sought the street.
“And that dark-faced one? I saw him again to-night by the door. Who is he? What can he want?”
There was a little group of people gathered by the door. As she passed out, she fancied she caught a glimpse of that dark, forbidding face, those evil eyes.
With a shudder she sped away. She was not pursued.
At her apartment she quickly changed into her own plain house dress. Having lighted the living-room fire, she waited a little for the return of Florence, who should have been home long before.
“What can be keeping her?”
With nervous, uncertain steps, she crossed to her own chamber door. Having entered, she went to the window. Her room was dark. The street below was half dark. A distant lamp cast a dim, swaying light. At first no one was to be seen. Then a single dark figure moved stealthily up the street. The swaying light caused this person to take on the appearance of an acrobat who leaped into the air, then came down like a rubber ball. Even when he paused to look up at the building before him, he seemed to sway like a drunken sailor.
“That may be the man.” Her pulse quickened.
A moment more and a car, careering down the street, lighted the man’s face. It did more. It brought into the open for a second another figure, deeper in the shadows.
“What a strange pair!” she murmured as she shrank back.
The man least concealed was the dark-faced one with the evil eye. The other man was Jaeger, the detective.
“But they are not together,” she assured herself. “Jaeger is watching the other, and the dark one is watching me.”
Even as she said this, a third person came into view.
Instantly, by his slow stride, his military bearing, she recognized the man.
“It is he!” She was thrown into a state of tumult. “It is my Frenchman.”
But what was this? He was on the opposite side of the street, yet he did not cross over, nor so much as glance that way. He marched straight on.
She wanted to rush down the stairs and call to him; yet she dared not, for were not those sinister figures lurking there?
To make matters worse, the dark-faced one took to following the Frenchman. Darting from shadow to shadow, he obviously believed himself unobserved. False security. Jaeger was on his trail.
“What does it all mean?” Jeanne asked herself. “Is this little Frenchman after all but a tool of the police? Does he hope to trap me and secure the pearls—which I do not have? Or is he with that evil one with the desperate eyes? Or is it true that he came but now from France and bears a message for me?”
Since she could answer none of these questions, she left her room, looked to the fastening of the outer door, then took a seat by the fire. There for a long time she tried to read her fortune in the flames, but succeeded in seeing only a flaming curtain that was not consumed.
Five days passed. Uneventful days they were for Petite Jeanne; yet each one was charged with possibilities both wonderful and terrible. She saw no more of Marjory Dean. What of her promise? Had she forgotten?
The little old lady of the cameo she visited once. The Chinese gentleman who might secure for her one more shuddering look at the magic curtain was out of town.
Never did she enter the opera at night without casting fearful glances about lest she encounter the dark-faced man of the evil eye. He was never there. Where was he? Who was he? What interest could he have in a mere boy usher of the opera? To these questions the little French girl could form no answer.
There were times when she believed him a gypsy, or at least a descendant of gypsies from France. When she thought of this she shuddered anew. For in France were many enemies of Bihari’s band. And she was one of that band.
At other times she was able to convince herself that she had seen this dark-faced one at the back of the boxes on that night when the priceless pearls had vanished. Yet how this could be when Jaeger, the detective, and the mysterious lady in black haunted those same shadows, she could not imagine.
Of late Jaeger was not always there. Perhaps he was engaged in other affairs. It might be that on that very night Jeanne had seen him follow the dark-faced one, he had made an important arrest. If so, whom had he apprehended, the dark-faced one or the little Frenchman with a military bearing?
Jeanne could not but believe that the little man from France was honest and sincere, that he truly bore an important message for her.
“But why then did he not come that night and deliver it?” she said to Florence.
“Perhaps he lost his way.”
“Lost his way? How could he? He was here, just across the way.”
“You say two men followed him?”
“Yes, yes!”
“Then he may have been frightened off.”
“If so, why did he not return?”
“Who can say?”
Ah, yes, who could? Certainly no one, for no one knew the full truth, which was that in her excitement Jeanne had mixed her numbers and, instead of presenting him with her own address, had sent him five blocks down the street where, as one must know, he found no little French girl named Petite Jeanne. So here is one matter settled, straight off. But what of the business-like little Frenchman? Did he truly bear a message of importance? If so, what was the message? And where was the man now? Not so easy to answer, these questions.
Jeanne asked herself these questions and many more during these days when, as Pierre, she served the occupants of the boxes faithfully, at the same time drinking in all the glory and splendor of music, color and drama that is Grand Opera at its best.
A glimpse now and then of the lady in black lurking in deep shadows never failed to thrill her. Never did she see her face. Not once did there come to her a single intimation of the position she filled at the opera. As she felt that unseen eye upon her, Jeanne experienced a strange sensation. She went hot and cold all over. Then a great calm possessed her.
“It is the strangest thing!” she exclaimed to Florence one night. “It is like—what would you call it?—a benediction. I am dreadfully afraid; yet I find peace. It is like, shall I say, like seeing God? Should you be afraid of God if you saw Him?”
“Yes, I think I might,” Florence answered soberly.
“Yet they say God is Love. Why should one fear Love?”
“Who knows? Anyway, your friend is not God. She is only a lady in black. Perhaps she is not Love either. Her true name may be Hate.”
“Ah, yes, perhaps. But I feel it is not so. And many times, oh my friend, when Ifeela thing is so itisso. But when I just think it is true, then it is not true at all. Is this not strange?”
“It is strange. But you gypsies are strange anyway.”
“Ah, yes, perhaps. For all that, I am not all gypsy. Once I was not gypsy at all, only a little French girl living in a little chateau by the side of the road.”
“Petite Jeanne,” Florence spoke with sudden earnestness, “have you no people living in France?”
“My father is dead, this I know.” The little French girl’s head drooped. “My mother also. I have no brothers nor sisters save those who adopted me long ago in a gypsy van. Who else can matter?”
“Uncles and aunts, cousins, grandparents?”
“Ah, yes.” The little French girl’s brow clouded. “Now I remember. There was one—we called her grandmother. Was she? I wonder. We play that so many things are true, we little ones. I was to see her twice. She was, oh, so grand!” She clasped her hands as if in a dream. “Lived at the edge of a wood, she did, a great black forest, in a castle.
“A very beautiful castle it was to look at on a sunny day, from the outside. Little towers and spires, many little windows, all round and square.
“But inside?” She made a face and shuddered. “Oh, so very damp and cold! No fires here. No lights there. Only a bit of a brazier that burned charcoal, very bright and not warm at all. A grandmother? A castle? Ah, yes, perhaps. But who wants so grand a castle that is cold? Who would wish for a grandmother who did not bend nor smile?
“And besides,” she added, as she sank into a chair, “she may not have been my grandmother at all. This was long ago. I was only a little one.”
“All the same,” Florence muttered to herself, some time later, “I’d like to know if that was her grandmother. It might make a difference, a very great difference.”
Then came for Petite Jeanne an hour of swiftly passing glory.
She had arisen late, as was her custom, and was sipping her black coffee when the telephone rang.
“This is Marjory Dean.” The words came to her over the wire in the faintest whisper. But how they thrilled her! “Is this Petite Jeanne? Or is it Pierre?” The prima donna was laughing.
“It is Petite Jeanne at breakfast,” Jeanne answered. Her heart was in her throat. What was she to expect?
“Then will you please ask Pierre if it will be possible for him to meet me at the Opera House stage door at three this afternoon?”
“I shall ask him.” Jeanne put on a business-like tone. For all that, her heart was pounding madly. “It may be my great opportunity!” she told herself. “I may yet appear for a brief space of time in an opera. What glory!”
After allowing a space of thirty seconds to elapse, during which time she might be supposed to have consulted the mythical Pierre, she replied quite simply:
“Yes, Miss Dean, Pierre will meet you at that hour. And he wishes me to thank you very much.”
“Sh! Never a word of this!” came over the phone; then the voice was gone.
Jeanne spent the remainder of the forenoon in a tumult of excitement. At noon she ate a light lunch, drank black tea, then sat down to study the score of her favorite opera, “The Juggler of Notre Dame.”
It is little wonder that Jeanne loved this more than any other opera. It is the story of a simple wanderer, a juggler. Jeanne, as we have said before, had been a wanderer in France. She had danced the gypsy dances with her bear in every village of France and every suburb of Paris.
And Cluny, a suburb of Paris, is the scene of this little opera. A juggler, curiously enough named Jean, arrives in this village just as the people have begun to celebrate May Day in the square before the convent.
The juggler is welcomed. But one by one his poor tricks are scorned. The people demand a drinking song. The juggler is pious. He fears to offend the Virgin. But at last, beseeching the Virgin’s forgiveness, he grants their request.
Hearing the shouts of the crowd, the prior of the monastery comes out to scatter the crowd and rebuke the singer. He bids the poor juggler repent and, putting the world at his back, enter the monastery, never more to wander over the beautiful hills of France.
In the juggler’s poor mind occurs a great struggle. And in this struggle these words are wrung from his lips:
“But renounce, when I am still young,Renounce to follow thee, oh, Liberty, beloved,Careless fay with clear golden smile!’Tis she my heart for mistress has chosen;Hair in the wind laughing, she takes my hand,She drags me on chance of the hour and the road.The silver of the waters, the gold of the blond harvest,The diamonds of the nights, through her are mine!I have space through her, and love and the world.The villain, through her, becomes king!By her divine charm, all smiles on me, all enchants,And, to accompany the flight of my song,The concert of the birds snaps in the green bush.Gracious mistress and sister I have chosen.Must I now lose you, oh, my royal treasure? Oh, Liberty, my beloved,Careless fay of the golden smile!”
“But renounce, when I am still young,
Renounce to follow thee, oh, Liberty, beloved,
Careless fay with clear golden smile!
’Tis she my heart for mistress has chosen;
Hair in the wind laughing, she takes my hand,
She drags me on chance of the hour and the road.
The silver of the waters, the gold of the blond harvest,
The diamonds of the nights, through her are mine!
I have space through her, and love and the world.
The villain, through her, becomes king!
By her divine charm, all smiles on me, all enchants,
And, to accompany the flight of my song,
The concert of the birds snaps in the green bush.
Gracious mistress and sister I have chosen.
Must I now lose you, oh, my royal treasure? Oh, Liberty, my beloved,
Careless fay of the golden smile!”
“Liberty ... careless fay of the golden smile.” Jeanne repeated these words three times. Then with dreamy eyes that spanned a nation and an ocean, she saw again the lanes, the hedges, the happy villages of France.
“Who better than I can feel as that poor juggler felt as he gave all this up for the monastery’s narrow walls?” she asked. No answer came back. She knew the answer well enough for all that. And this knowledge gave her courage for the hours that were to come.
She met Marjory Dean by one of the massive pillars that adorn the great Opera House.
“To think,” she whispered, “that all this great building should be erected that thousands might hear you sing!”
“Not me alone.” The prima donna smiled. “Many, many others and many, I hope, more worthy than I.”
“What a life you have had!” the little French girl cried rapturously. “You have truly lived!
“To work, to dream, to hope,” she went on, “to struggle onward toward some distant goal, this is life.”
“Ah, no, my child.” Marjory Dean’s face warmed with a kindly smile. “This is not life. It is but the beginning of life. One does not work long, hope much, struggle far, before he becomes conscious of someone on the way before him. As he becomes conscious of this one, the other puts out a hand to aid him forward. Together they work, dream, hope and struggle onward. Together they succeed more completely.
“And then,” her tone was mellow, thoughtful, “there comes the time when the one who had been given the helping hand by one before looks back and sees still another who struggles bravely over the way he has come. His other hand stretches back to this weaker one. And so, with someone before to assist, with one behind to be assisted, he works, dreams, hopes and struggles on through his career, be it long or short. And this, my child, is life.”
“Yes, I see it now. I knew it before. But one forgets. Watch me. I shall cling tightly to your hand. And when my turn comes I shall pray for courage and strength, then reach back to one who struggles a little way behind.”
“Wise, brave child! How one could love you!”
With this the prima donna threw her arm across Jeanne’s shoulder and together they marched into the place of solemn enchantment, an Opera House that is “dark.”
“To-day,” said Marjory Dean, as they came out upon the dimly lighted stage, “as you will see,” she glanced about her where the setting of a French village was to be seen “we are to rehearse ‘The Juggler of Notre Dame.’ And to-day, if you have the courage, you may play the juggler in my stead.”
“Oh!” Jeanne’s breath came short and quick. Her wild heartbeats of anticipation had not been in vain.
“But the company!” she exclaimed in a low whisper. “Shall they know?”
“They will not be told. Many will guess that something unusual is happening. But they all are good sports. And besides they are all of my—what is it you have called it?—my ‘Golden Circle.’”
“Yes, yes, your ‘Golden Circle.’”
“And those of our ‘Golden Circle’ never betray us. It is an unwritten law.”
“Ah!” Jeanne breathed deeply. “Can I do it?”
“Certainly you can. And perhaps, on the very next night when the ‘Juggler’ is done—oh, well, you know.”
“Yes. I know.” Jeanne was fairly choking with emotion.
When, however, half an hour later, garbed as the juggler with his hoop and his bag of tricks, she came before the troop of French villagers of the drama, she was her own calm self. For once again as in a dream, she trod the streets of a beautiful French village. As of yore she danced before the boisterous village throng.
Only now, instead of stick and bear, she danced with hoop and bag.
She was conscious at once that the members of the company realized that she was a stranger and not Marjory Dean.
“But I shall show them how a child of France may play her native drama.” At once she lost herself in the character of Jean, the wandering-juggler.
Eagerly she offered to do tricks with cup and balls, to remove eggs from a hat.
Scorned by the throng, she did not despair.
“I know the hoop dance.”
The children of the troop seized her by the hands to drag her about. And Jeanne, the lithe Jeanne who had so often enthralled thousands by her fairy-like steps, danced clumsily as the juggler must, then allowed herself to be abused by the children until she could break away.
“What a glorious company!” she was thinking in the back of her mind. “How they play up to me!”
“My lords,” she cried when once more she was free, “to please you I’ll sing a fine love salvation song.”
They paid her no heed. As the juggler she did not despair.
As Jeanne, she saw a movement in a seat close to the opera pit. “An auditor!” Her heart sank. “What if it is someone who suspects and will give me away!” There was scant time for these thoughts.
As the juggler she offered songs of battle, songs of conquest, drama. To all this they cried:
“No! No! Give us rather a drinking song!”
At last yielding to their demand she sang: “Hallelujah, Sing the Hallelujah of Wine.”
Then as the prior descended upon the throng, scattering them like tiny birds before a gale, she stood there alone, defenseless, as the prior denounced her.
Real tears were in her eyes as she began her farewell to the glorious liberty of hedge and field, river, road and forest of France.
This farewell was destined to end unfinished for suddenly a great bass voice roared:
“What is this? You are not Marjory Dean! Where is she? What are you doing here?”
A huge man with a fierce black mustache stood towering above her. She recognized in him the director of the opera, and wished that the section of the stage beneath her feet might sink, carrying her from sight.
“Here I am,” came in a clear, cold tone. It was Marjory Dean who spoke. She advanced toward the middle of the stage.
Riveted to their places, the members of the company stood aghast. Full well they knew the fire that lay ever smouldering in Marjory Dean’s breast.
“And what does this mean? Why are you not rehearsing your part?”
“Because,” Miss Dean replied evenly, “I chose to allow another, who can do it quite as well, to rehearse with the company.”
“And I suppose,” there was bitter sarcasm in the director’s voice, “she will sing the part when that night comes?”
“And if she did?”
“Then, Miss Dean, your services would no longer be required.” The man was purple with rage.
“Very well.” Marjory Dean’s face went white. “We may as well—”
But Petite Jeanne was at her side. “Miss Dean, you do not know what you are saying. It is not worth the cost. Please, please!” she pleaded with tears in her voice. “Please forget me. At best I am only a little French wanderer. And you, you are the great Marjory Dean!”
Reading the anguish in her upturned face, Marjory Dean’s anger was turned to compassion.
“Another time, another place,” she murmured. “I shall never forget you!”
Half an hour later the rehearsal was begun once more. This time Marjory Dean was in the stellar role. It was a dead rehearsal. All the sparkle of it was gone. But it was a rehearsal all the same, and the director had had his way.
As for Jeanne, once more dressed as Pierre and feeling like just no one at all, she had gone wandering away into the shadows of the orchestra floor, when suddenly she started. Someone had touched her arm.
Until this moment she had quite forgotten the lone auditor seated there in the dark. Now as she bent low to look into that person’s face she started again as a name came to her lips.
“Rosemary Robinson!”
“It is I,” Rosemary whispered. “I saw it all, Pierre.” She held Jeanne’s hand in a warm grasp. “You were wonderful! Simply magnificent! And the director. He was beastly!”
“No! No!” Jeanne protested. “He was but doing his duty.”
“This,” Rosemary replied slowly, “may be true. But for all that you are a marvelous ‘Juggler of Notre Dame.’ And it is too bad he found out.
“But come!” she whispered eagerly, springing to her feet. “Why weep when there is so much to be glad about? Let us go exploring!
“My father,” she explained, “has done much for this place. I have the keys to every room. There are many mysteries. You shall see some of them.”
Seizing Jeanne’s hand, she led the way along a corridor, down two gloomy flights of stairs and at last into a vast place where only here and there a light burned dimly.
They were now deep down below the level of the street. The roar and thunder of traffic came to them only as a subdued rumble of some giant talking in his sleep.
The room was immense. Shadows were everywhere, shadows and grotesque forms.
“Where are we?” Jeanne asked, scarcely able to repress a desire to flee.
“It is one of the property rooms of the Opera House. What will you have?” Rosemary laughed low and deep. “Only ask for it. You will find it here. All these things are used at some time or another in the different operas.”
As Jeanne’s eyes became accustomed to the pale half-light, she realized that this must be nearly true. In a corner, piled tight in great dark sections, was a miniature mountain. Standing on edge, but spilling none of its make-believe water, was a pond where swans were wont to float.
A little way apart were the swans, resting on great heaps of grass that did not wither and flowers that did not die.
In a distant corner stood a great gray castle. Someone had set it up, perhaps to make sure that it was all intact, then had left it standing.
“What a place for mystery!” Jeanne exclaimed.
“Yes, and listen! Do you hear it?”
“Hear what?”
“The river. We are far below the river. Listen. Do you not hear it flowing?”
“I hear only the rumble of traffic.”
“Perhaps I only imagine it, but always when I visit this place I seem to hear the river rushing by. And always I think, ‘What if the walls should crumble?’”
“But they will not crumble.”
“We shall hope not.
“But see.” The rich girl’s mood changed. “Here is a charger! Let us mount and ride!”
She sprang toward a tall object completely covered by a white cloth. When the cloth had been dragged off, a great steed all clad in glittering armor stood before them.
“Come!” Rosemary’s voice rose high. “Here we are! You are a brave knight. I am a defenseless lady. Give me your hand. Help me to mount behind you. Then I will cling to you while we ride through some deep, dark forest where there are dragons and cross-bowmen and all sorts of terrifying perils.”
Joining her in this spirit of make-believe, Jeanne assisted her to the back of the inanimate charger.
Having touched some secret button, Rosemary set the charger in motion. They were riding now. Swaying from side to side, rising, falling, they seemed indeed to be passing through some dark and doleful place. As Jeanne closed her eyes the illusion became quite complete. As she felt Rosemary clinging to her as she might cling to some gallant knight, she forgot for the time that she was Petite Jeanne and that she had suffered a dire disappointment.
“I am Pierre!” she whispered to herself. “I am a brave knight. Rosemary loves me.”
The disquieting effect of this last thought awakened her to the realities of life. Perhaps, after all, Rosemary did love her a little as Pierre. If this were true—
Sliding off the steed, then lifting Rosemary to the floor, she exclaimed:
“Come! Over yonder is a castle. Let us see who is at home over there.”
Soon enough she was to see.
The castle was, as all stage castles are, a mere shell; very beautiful and grand on the outside, a hollow echo within. For all that, the two youthful adventurers found a certain joy in visiting that castle. There was a rough stairway leading up through great empty spaces within to a broad, iron-railed balcony. From this balcony, on more than one night, an opera lover had leaned forth to sing songs of high enchantment, luring forth a hidden lover.
They climbed the stairs. Then Petite Jeanne, caught by the spell of the place, leaned far out of the window and burst into song, a wild gypsy serenade.
Rosemary was leaning back among the rafters, drinking in the sweet mystery of life that was all about her, when of a sudden the French girl’s song broke off. Her face went white for an instant as she swayed there and must surely have fallen had not Rosemary caught her.
“Wha—what is it?” she whispered hoarsely.
For a space of seconds there came no answer, then a low whisper:
“Those eyes! I saw them. Those evil eyes. Back of the mountain. They glared at me.”
“Eyes?”
“The dark-faced man. He—he frightens me! The way out! We must find it!”
Roused by her companion’s fears, Rosemary led the way on tiptoe down the stairs. Still in silence they crossed the broad emptiness of the castle, came to a rear door, tried it, felt it yield to their touch, and passed through, only to hear the intruder come racing down the stairs.
“He—he did not see us!” Rosemary panted. “For now we are safe. This—come this way!”
She crowded her way between a stairway lying upon its side and a property porch. Jeanne, whose heart was beating a tattoo against her ribs, followed in silence.
“What a brave knight I am!” she told herself, and smiled in spite of her deathly fears.
“The way out,” Rosemary whispered over her shoulder. “If I only can find that!”
A sound, from somewhere behind, startled them into renewed effort.
Passing through a low forest of property trees, they crossed a narrow bare space to find themselves confronted by a more formidable forest of chairs and tables. Chairs of all sorts, with feet on the floor or high in air, blocked their way.