DREAMS OF OTHER DAYS
Petite Jeanne left the opera house that night in a brown study. She was
perplexed beyond words. The necklace had not been found. She had made
sure of that when, between the second and third act, she had discovered
on a bulletin board of the lobby a typewritten notice of the loss and an
offer of a reward for the return of the pearls.
"If the pearls had been found that notice would have been taken down,"
she assured herself. "But if this is true, why did I go unmolested? One
would suppose that at least I would be questioned regarding the affair.
But no!" She shrugged her graceful shoulders. "They ask me nothing. They
look and look, and say nothing. Oh, yes, indeed, they say: 'What is your
name?' That most beautiful rich one, she says this. And the dark one who
is only a voice, she says: 'Do you like the opera?' She asks this. And
who is she? I know that voice. I have heard it before. It is very
familiar, yet I cannot recall it. If she is here again I shall see her
face."
Having thus worked herself into a state of deep perplexity that rapidly
ripened into fear, she glided, once her duties were done, down a narrow
aisle, across the end of the stage where a score of stage hands were busy
shifting scenes, then along a narrow passage-way, with which, as you will
know from reading _The Golden Circle_, she was thoroughly familiar. From
this passageway she emerged upon a second and narrower stage.
This was the stage of the Civic Theatre. The stage was dark. The house
was dark. Only the faintest gleam of light revealed seats like ghosts
ranged row on row.
How familiar it all seemed to her. The time had been when, not many
months back, she had stood upon that stage and by the aid of her
God-given gift, had stirred the audience to admiration, to laughter and
to tears.
As she stood there now a wave of feeling came over her that she could not
resist. This stage, this little playhouse had become to her what home
means to many. The people who had haunted those seats were _her_ people.
They had loved her. She had loved them. But now they were gone. The house
was dark, the light opera troop was scattered. She thought she knew how a
mother robin must feel as she visits her nest long after the fledglings
have flown.
Advancing to the center of the stage, she stretched her arms wide in mute
appeal to the empty seats. But no least whisper of admiration or
disapproval came back to her.
A moment she stood thus. Then, as her hands dropped, her breast heaved
with one great sob.
But, like the sea, Jeanne was made of many moods. "No! No!" She stamped
her small foot. "I will not come back to this! I will not! The way back
is closed. Only the door ahead is open. I will go on.
"Grand Opera, this is all now. This is art indeed. Pictures, music,
story. This is Grand Opera. Big! Grand! Noble! Some day, somehow I shall
stand upon that most wonderful of all stages, and those people, those
thousands, the richest, the most learned, the most noble, they shall be
my people!"
Having delivered this speech to the deserted hall, she once again became
a very little lady in a trim black dress suit, seeking a way to the outer
air and the street that led to home.
She had come this way because she feared that the slender, dark-faced
stranger who had accosted her earlier in the evening would await her at
the door.
"If he sees me he will follow," she told herself. "And then--"
She finished with a shudder.
In choosing this way she had counted upon one circumstance. Nor had she
counted in vain. As she hurried down the dark aisle toward the back of
the theatre which was, she knew, closed, she came quite suddenly upon a
man with a flashlight and time clock.
"Oh, Tommy Mosk!" she exclaimed in a whisper. "How glad I am that you are
still here!"
The watchman threw his light upon her face.
"Petite Jeanne!" he exclaimed. "But why the masquerade?" Tommy belonged
to those other days and, with the rest, had come to love the simple,
big-hearted little light opera star. "Petite Jeanne! But why--"
"Please don't make me tell." She gripped his arm. "Only let me out, and
see me safe into a taxi. And--and--" She put a finger to her lips. "Don't
whisper a word."
"I--it's irregular, but I--I'll do it," he replied gallantly.
Jeanne gave his arm another squeeze and they were away.
Three minutes later, still dressed as Pierre, the usher, she was huddled
on the broad seat of a taxi, speeding for home.