Page:The Tragic Muse (London & New York, Macmillan & Co., 1890), Volume 2.djvu/95

Rh a ball-room cleared for the dance, before the guests or the music had arrived.

"Oh, it's enough to see this; it makes my heart beat," said Miriam. "It's full of the vanished past, it makes me cry. I feel them here, the great artists I shall never see. Think of Rachel (look at her grand portrait there!) and how she stood on these very boards and trailed over them the robes of Hermione and Phèdre!" The girl broke out theatrically, as on the spot was right, not a bit afraid of her voice as soon as it rolled through the room; appealing to her companions as they stood under the chandelier and making the other persons present, who had already given her some attention, turn round to stare at so unusual a specimen of the English miss. She laughed musically when she noticed this, and her mother, scandalized, begged her to lower her tone. "It's all right. I produce an effect," said Miriam: "it sha'n't be said that I too haven't had my little success in the maison de Molière." And Sherringham repeated that it was all right—the place was familiar with mirth and passion, there was often wonderful talk there, and it was only the setting that was still and solemn. It happened that this evening—there was no knowing in advance—the scene was not characteristically brilliant; but to confirm his assertion, at the moment he spoke, Mademoiselle Dunoyer, who was also in the play, came into the room attended by a pair of gentlemen.

She was the celebrated, the perpetual, the necessary ingénue, who with all her talent could not have represented a woman of her actual age. She had the gliding, hopping movement of a small bird, the same air of having nothing to do with