Page:Rachel (1887 Nina H. Kennard).djvu/94

 sisters played and laughed, while close by sat her father and mother. Her happiness was complete.

Suddenly, one of the company present [evidently Janin himself] turned to the young girl and said: "What have you done with your red velvet bonnet of the month of July 1838?" Rachel, waking out of the dreamland where she had been wandering, smiled and answered, "What a memory you have! I should think I did remember my red bonnet. Maman made it," and she smiled across at her mother; "it was intended to be a summer and winter bonnet—the velvet for winter, the yellow rose in front for summer. I can recall the making of that bonnet so well, the satisfaction of my mother, the pride of my father, the astonishment of my younger sisters. I wore it during the first six months of my début. I used to put it on for rehearsal in the morning, put it on to go to my work in the evening, and naturally I put it on when sometimes my mother took me to the play. On one occasion Mademoiselle Mars was acting (I had appeared in Hermione the evening before and the receipts had amounted to 700 francs), and I was given a free ticket for the gallery. Imagine my delight. I presented myself with my red bonnet. Despair I they stopped me as I was going in. 'Where are you going dressed like that?' cried out one of the men at the box office, and all I could succeed in obtaining was a place among the gods against a column. And I now remember," she added, with a serious look, "that an old gentlemen, seeing how rudely I had been treated, stopped me as I was ascending the stairs to the third gallery. 'Ah! Mademoiselle,' he said, with a sweeping bow, 'there are people who ought to regret one day their want of respect for your bonnet, and I know some, beginning with an old fellow like myself, who would proudly carry your yellow rose in his button-hole.' He spoke, bowed, and disappeared, and mamma and I and the yellow rose ascended to the top."

Receiving, morning and evening, as she was at this time, more flowers than she could take away, and possessing more jewels and gowns than she could wear, she could afford to joke about the red velvet bonnet with the yellow rose, strong in that philosophy taught by sudden changes of fortune. She would turn from the adulation and luxury of her years of success, and seek repose in intimate familiarity with her family and friends, loving to recall the thoughtless days and poetic