Cruel As The Grave Part 25

CHAPTER XVI.

ON THE WATCH.

False--from the head's crown to the foot's sole--false!

To think I never knew it until now, Nor saw thro' him e'en when I saw him smile; Saw that he meant this when he wed me, When he caressed me! Yes, when he kissed my lips!--BROWNING

While this busy scene was being enacted below stairs, equally important, if quieter dramas were being performed in the dressing-rooms up-stairs, where the maskers were putting the last finishing touches to their toilets.

In Mrs. Berners' dressing-room, Sybil, the queen of the festival, was alone. Mr. Berners, who had a.s.sumed the character of "Harold, the last of the Saxon Kings," had already completed his toilet and gone below stairs, as he said, to take his place near the door to welcome his guests as they should enter the drawing-room.

So Sybil was alone in her apartment. She also had just completed her toilet, and now she stood before the large cheval mirror, surveying the reflection of her figure from its clear surface, where it looked like a framed picture.

Ah! far the most beautiful, far the most terrible figure in the pageantry of the evening would be that of Sybil Berners! She had chosen for her character the unprecedented part of the impersonation of the Spirit of Fire. It suited well with her whole nature. She was a true child of the sun--a fervent Fire Worshipper, if ever there lived one in a Christian community. And now her costume was but the outward sign of the inward fervor. Let me try to describe it.

She wore a robe of chameleon-hued satin, so artfully woven, with a warp of golden thread and woof of crimson silk, that, as with every change of light and shade, it glowed in ruby coals or blazed in amber flames; and as with every motion of her graceful form it flashed around her, she seemed to be clothed in living fire.

She wore a burning garnet, like a live coal on her bosom; and on her brow a golden circle set with garnets, and having golden points set with amber and topaz, and tipped with diamonds, and flashing like little tongues of flame from a circle of fire.

Her mask was of golden gauze, perfectly moulded to her beautiful features.

Never had Sybil Berners worn a dress so perfectly expressive of herself as this, for she herself was Fire!

She had confided the secret of her costume to no one but to her husband, not even to her guest--courtesy did not oblige her to do that; and in order to preserve the secret inviolate, she had on this occasion dressed herself without the a.s.sistance of her maid.

Being now ready to join the maskers, she slipped a large dark cloak over her dress, opened the chamber door cautiously to see that the hall was clear, found it to be so at that moment, and slipped out, glided down the front stairs, elbowing crowds that were pushing up, and so pa.s.sed down to the lower hall, and stole through the mult.i.tude that filled it up, back to the rear door. She pa.s.sed around the outside of the house to the front door, and entered with the swarm of new arrivals.

Would the ushers, Joe Joy and Miss Tabby, recognize their lady? That was the question, and that was the test. She pa.s.sed up with the rest, letting her black cloak slip down to reveal her robe and crown of fire.

"Heaven save us! who comes here? It must be a mermaid from the 'lake that burneth with fire and brimstone for ever and ever.' It's a she, anyhow, and belongs to your department, thanks be to goodness!"

whispered Joseph Joy, to his companion in duty.

"This way, ma'am, if you please. Delia, pa.s.s this lady on to the ladies'

dressing-room," said unconscious Miss Tabby, courtesying and pointing.

And Sybil pa.s.sed on, smiling to herself to perceive that not even her old family domestics had recognized her face or form. So, keeping up her stratagem of being one of the masked guests of the ball, she entered the large chamber that had been chosen for the ladies' dressing-room and fitted up with a dozen small dressing-tables and mirrors. Her entrance created a sensation even among that fantastic crowd, each individual of which was a wonder in him or herself.

"Oh! look there!" simultaneously whispered twenty masks to forty others, as they caught sight of her.

"What a marvellous dress! What a splendid creature!"

"What a dazzling costume!"

"She throws us all in the shade."

These were a few of the impulsive e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.ns of admiration that were pa.s.sed from one to another, as Sybil flashed through the throng and stopped before a dressing-table, where she made a pretence of putting a few finishing touches to her dress.

Then, certain of not having been recognized, and wishing to escape such close scrutiny in such confined quarters, she joined a group of ladies who, having completed their own toilets, were just then pa.s.sing out of the chamber door into the upper hall, where they were met by their gentleman escorts.

There was no one to meet Sybil; a circ.u.mstance that was not of much importance, since there were one or two other ladies of the same party, who, having no escort of their own, had to follow in the wake of others.

Nor would Sybil have minded this at all, had she not looked over the bal.u.s.trades and seen issuing from the little pa.s.sage leading from Mrs.

Blondelle's room, two figures--a gentleman and a lady. The gentleman she instantly recognized as her husband, by his dress as "Harold, the last of the Saxon Kings." The lady she felt certain must be Rosa Blondelle, as she wore the dress of "Edith the Fair," the favorite of the King.

For an instant Sybil reeled under this shock; and then she recovered herself, re-gathered all her strength, and sternly crushing down all this weakness, pa.s.sed on as a guest among her guests to the door of the drawing-room.

There they were received by a very venerable mask with a long and flowing white beard, and dressed in a gold 'broidered black velvet tunic, white hose, white gauntlets, and red buskins, and holding a long brazen wand. This was no other than "Father Abe," the oldest man on the manor, personating my "Lord Polonius," that prince of gentlemen ushers and gold sticks in waiting.

While Sybil stood behind the group, she saw her husband and her rival precede every one to the door.

"Names, if you please, sir?" inquired the usher with a bow.

"Harold the Saxon and Edith the Fair," answered Mr. Berners in a low voice.

"Mr. Harry Claxton and Miss Esther Clair!" shouted poor old Abe at the top of his voice as he opened wider the door to admit his unknown master and the lady.

"Name, sir, please?" he continued, addressing the next party.

"Rob Roy Macgregor."

"Mr. Robert McCracker!" shouted the usher, pa.s.sing in this mask, and pa.s.sing immediately to the next with, "Name, missus, please?"

"Fenella the dumb girl," murmured a very shy little maiden, whom the usher immediately announced as "An Ell of a dumb girl!" And so on, he went, making the most absurd as well as the most awful blunders with ladies' and gentlemen's names, as announcing the "Grand Turk" as Miss Ann Burke; for which last mistake the poor old man was not much to blame, as the subject was but a little fellow in a turban and long gown, whom Polonius naturally took to be a woman in a rather fantastic female dress. But when he thundered forth a "Musketeer" as a "mosquito," and a "Crusader" as a "curiosity," and "Joan of Arc" as "Master Johnny Dark,"

he was quite unpardonable.

Meanwhile Sybil had entered the room, which was blazing with light and resounding with music. As the guests were now nearly all a.s.sembled, the gentlemen selected partners and opened the ball with a grand promenade to the music of the grand march in "Faust."

Introductions are of course unnecessary at private masquerades, as well as impracticable at all such festivals; so when the ghastly mask "Death"

came up and offered his skeleton arm to Sybil for the promenade, she unhesitatingly accepted it, supposing him all the while to be one of her invited guests.

But in joining the promenaders, he entered the circle at a point immediately in the rear of Harold the Saxon, and Edith the Fair. Death kept his eye on the two, and speaking in a low voice, inquired of his companion;

"Beautiful mask! though we may not yet discover ourselves to each other, yet we are at liberty to form a guess of the ident.i.ty of our friends here?"

"Yes," answered Sybil, in a low voice. She scarcely understood what she had been asked, or what she had answered; for her whole attention was absorbed in watching her husband and her rival, who were walking immediately before her--so close, yet so unconscious of her presence; so near in person, yet so far in spirit!

"--As, for instance, lovely mask," continued Death, "I think I know this 'Fair Edith' as the beautiful blonde who is staying here with our hostess. Am I not right?"

"Yes," answered Sybil, in the same absent and unconscious manner; for she really had not the slightest idea of what he had been talking about, but only a half-conscious instinct that the best and shortest, as well as the most courteous, way, in which to be rid of him was to agree with all he said. Her whole attention was still painfully absorbed by the pair before her.

"But as for the gentleman, Saxon Harold, I do not recognize him at all!

However, he seems to be quite devoted to his fair Edith, as is most natural! Fair Edith was his best beloved! best beloved? Yes, beloved far beyond his queen!"

Sybil knew what he was saying now! She was listening to him with her ears, while she was watching the pair before her with her eyes.

"When Harold's dead body was found on the battle-field, it was not the queen, but Fair Edith, who was sent for to identify it, and to her it was given," continued the stranger.

A half-suppressed cry broke from Sybil's lips.