The Hippodrome Part 14

She had been clumsy, ungraceful, had failed--that was enough.

Arith.e.l.li herself scarcely heard the sounds of execration, as she stood swaying with one hand over her eyes to shut out the horrible glare.

She was conscious only of that and the strident noise of the band, and the sensation of choking she had felt once before. The instinct of all animals to hide themselves in the dark when ill, was strong upon her.

The fat little ring-master who alone had the sense to see there was something wrong, advanced and spoke to her in an agitated whisper. She gave him her hand and he led her out, leaving her hurriedly to go back and apologise to the irate spectators, and to claim their indulgence on the score of her sudden faintness.

Would she ever get to her room, Arith.e.l.li wondered, as she struggled down the pa.s.sage. It had never seemed so long before. Her hand went up to her throat again. She longed for something cool to drink to relieve the aching and dryness. It must be caused by the heat and dust of the ring, she thought.

A man's voice sounded behind her, and then hurrying footsteps. She pulled her long blue cloak round her and went on without answering or turning her head. It could only be the Manager coming to upbraid her.

An arm was flung round her protectingly and she turned with the face of a hunted animal, and looked up into the wild dark eyes of Vardri.

"What has happened? You're ill! It's no wonder. _Mon Dieu_, those brutes last night . . ."

He pulled her head back against his shoulder, dropping his voice to a murmur of exquisite gentleness. "_Mon enfant--ma pet.i.te enfant_!"

"You saw me fall?" she whispered.

"The men told me when they brought Don Juan out. I didn't see what happened. Were you hurt or only faint?"

"Oh, my hand? That's nothing. Emile says it will heal in a day or two. But I felt so stupid. . . . Vardri, you don't think I'm going to be ill, do you? I've never been ill in my life . . . never!"

The boy made some incoherent answer. Her piteous entreaty tore at his heart. Every fibre in his starved body ached with the desire to give her the rest and peace she needed above all things.

What could he do without money? His own miserable wages barely served for necessities. He was only a useless vagabond, an outcast. He ground his teeth together at the thought of his own impotence.

"Courage, little one. They will cheer you again to-morrow. They are cruel, these Spaniards, and fickle. You must not care."

It did not seem strange to either of them that he should be holding her in his arms. After last night everything had changed. Love, Youth, and Nature were hard at work weaving the bonds that drew them together.

The fact that she suffered his caresses had given him the right of manhood to protect her, to be her champion, to fight her battles. If he could do nothing else for her, at least he could fight. For him the crown of happiness could be found in loyal service. Of love-making in its ordinary sense, Vardri neither thought nor dreamed. To have found his Ideal, the one woman, surely that was enough. The innate fastidiousness that goes with good breeding had kept his life clean, his hands unsoiled.

He had hated the other women in the Circus, and felt sorry for them at the same time; and on their side they liked him and regarded him somewhat as a fool. Their voices, their coa.r.s.e expressions, their light jokes all jarred on him.

He pitied them, for their lives were as hard as his own, and when he could he helped them, for among the wanderers in Bohemia there is an ever-abiding comradeship. The element of fanaticism in his nature, which had once been absorbed by the Cause, now spent itself upon a human being.

The firm yet gentle clasp in which he held her, was the outward symbol of the love and courage that made him tense as steel. To every man there comes his hour, and his was now. Both for her sake and his own he dare not keep her with him. That they had been left undisturbed so long was a miracle. Besides, as she was ill, the sooner she was in bed the better.

He half led, half carried her to the door of her dressing room, and she thanked him with a smile, a gesture. Her throat hurt so much that all speech was an effort.

"You must go now," she whispered. "You will get into trouble again through me."

The boy threw a quick furtive glance along the whitewashed pa.s.sage.

With characteristic recklessness he had forgotten that the chances of his summary dismissal were looming exceedingly near.

He had left half his work undone the previous night, he had appeared late that morning, and now he was in a part of the building to which all the grooms and stable helpers were forbidden entrance.

"You'll let me bring you home," he pleaded.

Arith.e.l.li shook her head. "You can't."

"Is Emile coming for you? You shall not go alone, that I swear!"

"Emile will send someone. They never let me go alone. If you will, you may do this. If I am not down at the stables at half-past eight to-morrow, will you find Emile and ask him to come to me. He will be there doing my work."

"And you will sleep and be well to-morrow? To-morrow you will ride again, and there will be the applause."

Even as he spoke he knew his words were foolishness. The feverish skin, dry lips and eyes that were like burning holes in the thin oval face were signs and tokens enough for the most unseeing of men. And Vardri had suffered sufficiently himself to be able to recognise genuine illness.

She slipped from his arms.

The little dreary laugh made him shiver.

"_Mille remerciments, mon camarade_. I'm a failure, and failures are best left alone. _C'est ainsi que la vie_!"

Hers was the sole fiasco in an otherwise successful performance.

The final spectacle was a lurid representation of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.

This species of scriptural tableaux was frequently given, and was greatly to the taste of the spectators.

Such scenes were regularly presented in the theatres and heartily enjoyed by the superst.i.tious and devout populace, who found in them nothing incongruous or repulsive to their piety.

In this particular display the Manager had excelled himself, and achieved above all things a most vivid realism.

The gentleman who impersonated the patriarch Lot had a distinctly modern air, and resembled a third-rate Anarchist in depressing circ.u.mstances.

He was dark and swarthy, and possessed a ferocious expression, and on the whole suggested a caricature of Emile in his worst frame of mind.

He appeared in company with his reluctant spouse, whom he dragged along by the hand, she meanwhile obviously unwilling to leave the urban delights of the Cities of the Plain for a pastoral and dull existence in the desert, and as she was several sizes larger than her husband, she seemed likely to get the best of the encounter.

She was the same fat Englishwoman who had driven Arith.e.l.li's horses in the chariot. She was by no means young, she had applied her rouge with a lavish hand, and her golden wig was an outrage. Her airs and graces were those of a well-fed operatic soprano.

She advanced in jerks, she clutched at her plump anatomy and she rolled her eyes appealingly at the gallery, which responded with delighted yells.

In her train came a small flock of dejected-looking, but real sheep, which were seemingly inspired by sufficient intelligence to wish to avoid the coming catastrophe.

The city (or cities) was represented by coa.r.s.ely-painted scenery, and, owing to some defect in the perspective, appeared to be only a few feet from the travellers, though doubtless intended to fill the distant horizon.

The fleeing pair jerked slowly across the stage in time to subdued but bra.s.sy music from the Hippodrome band, the sheep followed, and thunder and lightning were heard and seen.

Flashes and bangs resounded, the doomed city rocked upon its foundations, and the audience joined in the uproar.

Sacks full of flour descended from Heaven and burst, converting the fleshly Mrs. Lot into the traditional pillar of salt, and the house and the curtain were brought down together.