The play was as lively as any four children could desire. It was called
_The Grand Duke Alexis_; it had a great deal to do with Nihilism and
with the Russians generally. There was a very handsome woman in it who
had a mission to kill somebody, and a very evil-looking man whose
mission it was to get her arrested; and the handsome woman and the
wicked man seemed to chase each other on and off the stage, and to
mingle up in the plot, and to fasten themselves in some unpleasant
manner into my brain. I am sure the boys enjoyed themselves vastly, and
there is no doubt that I was interested.
"Your eyes are like the eyes of an owl," whispered Charley to me; "if
they get any rounder they'll drop out like marbles."
I was accustomed to this kind of remark, and was too much fascinated
with the lovely lady and the man who was trying to arrest her to take
any notice of his words. The Grand Duke was certainly the most
appallingly wicked person I had ever imagined. Even father's new wife
seemed pale and commonplace and everyday beside him. Even the fact that
my own precious mother was superseded by another was of no consequence
at all when I recalled to memory that lovely lady's face, and the face
of the man who was trying to have her arrested.
The play came to an end, but when we arrived home Hannah had not yet
returned. We let ourselves in, in lordly fashion, with the latchkey.
Von Marlo bade us good-bye, and promised to come in again on the
following day. He said he would stand by us. He gave my hand an
affectionate squeeze.
"Make the best of things," he said; "there's a good girl."
I began to think Von Marlo a very comfortable sort of friend. I wished
that he was a girl instead of a boy. I could have been quite fond of
him had he been a girl.
We three sat in the parlour; we would not go to bed until Hannah came
in. We began to nod presently, and Alex dropped off to sleep. It was
past midnight when we heard Hannah's steps creeping upstairs towards her
bedroom. Charley immediately rushed on tiptoe to the parlour door,
opened it a tenth of an inch, and peeped out.
"She is off to bed. She is walking as straight as a die. She has got
on her best bonnet. I hope she'll be in a better temper in the morning.
Now then, I'm going to follow her example; I'm dead-beat I shall be
asleep in a twinkling."
He went off; his good-humoured, boyish face flashed back at us full of
fun. Father's marriage, the knowledge that there would soon be a lady
in the house, whom some people would call his new mamma, did not affect
him very deeply.