The snow was crisp and the air as cold as ice. We were playing the last
performance of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.” We had been playing it for two
weeks, and I had been given two different parts, Marie Claire, in which,
to my joy, I wore a gold wig and a lace tea-gown--which I made from an
old pair of lace curtains and a lavender silk dress mama had had when
they were rich and she dressed for dinner--and Cassy. I did love that
part where Cassy says:
“Simon Legree, you are afraid of me, and you have reason to be, for I
have got the devil in me!”
I used to hiss those words at him and glare until the audience clapped
me for that. Ada saw me play Cassy one night, and she went home and told
mama that I had “sworn like a common woman before all the people on the
stage” and that I ought not to be allowed to disgrace the family. But
little I cared for Ada in those days. _I_ was learning to be an actress!
On this last night, in fact, I experienced all the sensations of a
successful star. Someone had passed up to me, over the footlights if you
please, a real bouquet of flowers, and with these clasped to my breast,
I had retired smiling and bowing from the stage.
To add to my bliss, Patty Chase, the girl who played Topsy, came running
in to say that a gentleman friend of hers was “crazy” to meet me. He was
the one who had sent me the flowers. He wanted to know if I wouldn’t
take supper with him and a friend and Patty that night.
My! I felt like a regular professional actress. To think an unknown man
had admired me from the front, and was actually seeking my acquaintance!
I hesitated, however, because Patty was not the sort of girl I was
accustomed to go out with. I liked Patty pretty well myself, but my
brother Charles had one day come to the house especially to tell papa
some things about her--he had seen me walking with Patty on the
street--and papa had forbidden me to go out with her again. As I
hesitated, she said:
“It isn’t as if they are strangers, you know. One of them, Harry Bond,
is my own fellow. You know who his folks are, and but for them we’d have
been married long ago. Well, Harry’s friend, the one who wants to meet
you, is a swell, too, and he hasn’t been out from England long. Harry
says his folks are big nobs over there, and
[Illustration: Someone had passed up to me over the footlights, if you
please, a real bouquet of flowers.]
he is studying law here. His folks send him a remittance and I guess
it’s a pretty big one, for he’s living at the Windsor, and I guess he
can treat us fine. So come along. You’ll not get such a chance again.”
“Patty,” I said, “I’m afraid I dare not. Mama hates me to be out late,
and, see, it’s eleven already.”
“Why, the night’s just beginning,” cried Patty.
There was a rap at the door, and Patty exclaimed:
“Here they are now!”
All the girls in the room were watching me--enviously, I thought--and
one of them made a catty remark about Patty, who had gone out in the
hall, and was whispering to the men. I decided not to go, but when I
came out of the room there they were all waiting for me and Patty
exclaimed:
“Here she is,” and, dragging me along by the hand, she introduced me to
the men.
I found myself looking up into the face of a tall young man of about
twenty-three. He had light curly hair and blue eyes. His features were
fine and clear-cut, and, to my girlish eyes, he appeared extraordinarily
handsome and distinguished, far more so even than Colonel Stevens, who
had, up till then, been my ideal of manly perfection. Everything he wore
had an elegance about it from his evening suit and the rich fur-lined
overcoat to his opera hat and gold-topped cane. I felt flattered and
overwhelmingly impressed to think that such a fine personage should have
singled me out for especial attention. What is more, he was looking at
me with frank and undisguised admiration. Instead of letting go my hand,
which he had taken when Patty introduced us, he held it while he asked
me if he couldn’t have the pleasure of taking me out to supper. As I
hesitated, blushing and awfully thrilled by the hand pressing mine,
Patty said:
“She’s scared. Her mother won’t let her stay out late at night. She’s
never been out to supper before.”
Then she and Harry Bond burst out laughing, as if that were a good joke
on me, but Mr. Bertie (his name was the Honorable Reginald
Bertie--pronounced Bartie) did not laugh. On the contrary, he looked
very sympathetic, and pressed my hand the closer. I thought to myself:
“My! I must have looked lovely as Marie St. Claire. Wait till he sees me
as Camille.”
“I’m not afraid,” I contradicted Patty, “but mama will be worried. She
sits up for me.”
This was not strictly true, but it sounded better than to say that Ada
was the one who always sat up for anyone in the house who went out at
night. She even used to sit up for my brother Charles before he was
married, and I could just imagine the cross-questioning she would put me
through when I got in late. Irritated as I used to be in those days at
what I called Ada’s interference in my affairs, I know now that she
always had my best good at heart. Poor little delicate Ada! with her
passionate devotion and loyalty to the family and her fierce,
antagonistic attitude to all outside intrusion. She was morbidly
sensitive.
Mr. Bertie quieted my fears by dispatching a messenger boy to our house
with a note saying that I had gone with a party of friends to see the
Ice Palace.
Even with Ada in the back of my mind, I was now, as Patty would say,
“out for a good time,” and when Mr. Bertie carefully tucked the fur
robes of the sleigh about me, I felt warm, excited and recklessly happy.
We drove over to the Square, where the Ice Palace was erected. The
Windsor Hotel was filled with American guests who were on the balconies
watching the torchlight procession marching around the mountain. My
brother Charles was one of the snow-shoers, and the men were all dressed
in white and striped blanket overcoats with pointed capuchons (cowls) on
their backs or heads, and moccasins on their feet.
It was a beautiful sight, that procession, and looked like a snake of
light, winding about old Mount Royal, and when the fireworks burst all
about the monumental Ice Palace, inside of which people were dancing and
singing, really it seemed to me like a scene in fairyland. I felt a
sense of pride in our Montreal, and looking up at Mr. Bertie, to note
the effect of so much beauty upon him, I found him watching me instead.
The English, when they first come out to Canada, always assume an air of
patronage toward the “Colonials,” as they call us, just as if, while
interested, they are also highly amused by our crudeness. Now Mr. Bertie
said:
“We’ve seen enough of this Ice Palace’s hard, cold beauty. Suppose we go
somewhere and get something warm inside us. Gad, I’m dry.”
Harry told the driver to take us to a place whose name I could not
catch, and presently we drew up before a brilliantly lighted restaurant.
Harry Bond jumped out, and Patty after him. I was about to follow when I
felt a detaining hand upon my arm, and Bertie called out to Bond:
“I’ve changed my mind, Bond. I’ll be hanged if I care to take Miss
Ascough into that place.”
Bond was angry, and demanded to know why Bertie had told him to order
supper for four. He said he had called the place up from the theatre. I
thought that queer. How could they
[Illustration: I found him watching me.]
have known I would go, since I had not decided till the last minute?
“Never mind,” said Bertie. “I’ll fix it up with you later. Go on in
without us. It’s all right.”
Harry and Patty laughed, and, arm-in-arm, they went into the restaurant.
All the time Bertie had kept a hand on my arm. I was too surprised and
disappointed to utter a word, and after he had again tucked the rug
about me, he said gently:
“I wouldn’t take a sweet little girl like you into such a place, and
that Patty isn’t a fit person for you to associate with.”