Page:Burton Stevenson--The marathon mystery.djvu/122

100 We swung around into Broadway, ablaze with light, and Cecily forgot me in the excitement of watching the changing crowd, the brilliant shop-fronts.

“Here we are,” I said, as the cab drew up at the curb, and sprang out and helped her down.

As we entered the foyer, I heard that murmur of surprise and admiration which I knew my companion must inevitably call forth. As for her, she was interested in everything; the lights, the colour, the movement of the crowd, the bustle of the great theatre combined to form an excitant which brought the deep blood surging to her cheeks. She looked around with half-open lips, smiling, pleased as a child, seemingly quite unconscious of the many curious eyes centred upon her.

“Oh, it is glorious!” she cried. “I have to thank you again, ché.”

“You have nothing like this at St. Pierre?” I questioned, laughing at her eagerness.

“No,” and she shook her head; “except perhaps the Carnival.”

“I’m enjoying it, too,” I said; and, indeed, I was, for her happiness was contagious. She seemed charged with electricity, overflowing, communicating it by a look, a word, a smile.

We went up to the promenade after the first act, and ate an ice together. The place was crowded, and Cecily soon became again the centre of attraction. Men strolled past merely to look at her, and from more than one woman I caught a flash of the eye that said unutterable things. The advent of a new, incomparable siren could not pass unchallenged. At them