Page:The Happy Hypocrite - Beerbohm - 1897.pdf/28

 that he had thought she would be still abed. That sinister old proverb, La jalouse se lève de bonne beure, rose in his memory. His eye fell unconsciously on a large, round mask made of dull silver, with the features of a human face traced over its surface in faint filigree.

“Your lordship wonders what mask that is!” chirped Mr. Aeneas, tapping the thing with one of his little finger nails.

“What is that mask?” Lord George murmured, absently.

“I ought not to divulge, my lord,” said the mask-maker. “But I know your lordship would respect a professional secret, a secret of which I am pardonable proud. This,” he said, “is a mask for the sun-god, Apollo, whom heaven bless!”

“You astound me,” said Lord George.

“Of no less a person, I do assure you. When Jupiter, his father, made him lord of the day, Apollo craved that he might sometimes see the doings of mankind in the hours of night time. Jupiter granted so reasonable a request, and when next Apollo had passed over the sky and hidden in the sea, and darkness had fallen on all the world, he raised his head above the waters that he might