The Duke of Portmanteau .... Lord Harold Gray.
The Duchess ................ Lady Gray.
The celebrated Gray jewels, including the great Rose Diamond, will be
worn by Lady Gray in this number.
* * * * * * * * * *
No wonder Obermuller was raging. I looked at him. You don't like to
tackle a fellow like that when he's dancing hot. And yet you ache to
help him and--yes, yourself.
"Lord Harold's here yet, and the jewels?" I asked.
He gave a short nod. He was thinking. But so was I.
"Then all he wants is a Lady?"
"That's all," he said sarcastically.
"Well, what's the matter with me?"
He gasped.
"There's nothing the matter with your nerve, Olden."
"Thank you, so much." It was the way Gray says it when she tries to
have an English accent. "Dress me up, Fred Obermuller, in Gray's new
silk gown and the Gray jewels, and you'd never--"
"I'd never set eyes on you again."
"You'd never know, if you were in the audience, that it wasn't Gray
herself. I can take her off to the life, and if the prompter'll stand
by--"
He looked at me for a full minute.
"Try it, Olden," he said.
I did. I flew to Gray's dressing-room. She'd gone home deathly ill,
of course. They gave me the best seamstress in the place. She let out
the waist a bit and pulled over the lace to cover it. I got into that
mass of silk and lace--oh, silk on silk, and Nance Olden inside! Beryl
Blackburn did my hair, and Grace Weston put on my slippers. Topham,
himself, hung me with those gorgeous shining diamonds and pearls and
emeralds, till I felt like an idol loaded with booty. There were so
many standing round me, rigging me up, that I didn't get a glimpse of
the mirror till the second before Ginger called me. But in that
second--in that second, Mag Monahan, I saw a fairy with blazing cheeks
and shining eyes, with a diamond coronet in her brown hair, puffed
high, and pearls on her bare neck and arms, and emeralds over the
waist, and rubies and pearls on her fingers, and sprays of diamonds
like frost on the lace of her skirt, and diamond buckles on her very
slippers, and the rose diamond, like a sun, outshining all the rest;
and--and, Mag, it was me!
How did it go? Well, wouldn't it make you think you were a Lady, sure
enough, if you couldn't move without that lace train billowing after
you; without being dazzled with diamond-shine; without a truly Lord
tagging after you?
He kept his head, Lord Harold did--even if it is a mutton-head. That
helped me at first. He was so cold, so stupid, so slow, so
good-tempered--so just himself. And after the first plunge--
I tell you, Mag Monahan, there's one thing that's stronger than wine to
a woman--it's being beautiful. Oh! And I was beautiful. I knew it
before I got that quick hush, with the full applause after it. And
because I was beautiful, I got saucy, and then calm, and then I caught
Fred Obermuller's voice--he had taken the book from the prompter and
stood there himself--and after that it was easy sailing.
He was there yet when the act was over, and I trailed out, followed by
my Lord. He let the prompt-book fall from his hands and reached them
both out to me.