CHAPTER XXI.

“DON CAESAR DE BAZAN.”

The big French ball, that annual revel at the metropolis, brings together a motley assemblage of the devotees of folly. The scene at the entrance to Madison Square Garden to-night is the same scene witnessed at this function the year preceding, and the year before that. A mass of cabs and carriages in apparently inextricable confusion fill the street. They struggle up and deposit their fares and escorts and chaperons fight their way through the mob that blocks the brilliantly lighted entrance, and not always without an unpleasant encounter.

Upon the threshold of the gay interior Louise Hathaway pauses diffidently and thanks fortune that a mask hides her face from the inquisitive stares around her. But led by Jack Ashley, Louise and Mr. Felton proceed to a box and once within its shelter the young girl gives herself up to an unmixed enjoyment of the brilliant spectacle before her.

The scene is decorous, even sedate. Few acquaintances have been made, and when the strains of “Loin du Bal” arise in voluptuous swell only a small number of dancers respond.

“Why this is as proper as one of our country dances, and far less noisy,” Louise whispers to Ashley, but that knowing young man winks mysteriously behind his mask and remarks: “Wait!”

“Oh, but I shan’t wait,” is the young lady’s response. “You remember what I emphatically declared—only an hour or two and then we return to the hotel.”

“Then you need fear nothing that would shock you in the least degree,” Ashley assures her. “The rioting does not begin until after midnight, and does not amount to much then. But see. The floor is filling up, the reserve is wearing off, and it would need only the eruption of some reckless spirit to bring on a pandemonium.”

It is apparent that only a desire to humor the wishes of Miss Hathaway has led Cyrus Felton to the garden. And yet it is all so novel, all so bright and full of color, that he becomes interested in spite of himself, and when Ashley proposes a tour of the floor with a peep at the wine-room, Mr. Felton glances irresolutely at Louise. The young lady nods an assent.

“Do not be gone long,” she enjoins, “although I could listen to the music and watch the picture half the night.”

When they are gone she leans back in her chair, partly draws the box draperies, and watches dreamily the ever-changing panorama on the vast floor. Suddenly there is borne to her ears a melody strangely sweet, yet filled with a subtle melancholy. Louise catches her breath and listens. It is the andante of the Beethoven Sonata Pathetique she played so often in her old Raymond home. It has always been her favorite, and she is really an artist in soul and execution. Some one is whistling softly the divine first theme, and with a tenderness she has often felt yet could not satisfactorily express through the medium of an unsympathetic pianoforte.

She leans over the box and her eyes rest upon the figure of a man attired in the costume of Don Caesar de Bazan. He is leaning carelessly against the pillar of the box in which she is sitting, not a dozen feet from her. So closely does his costume fit him and so bravely does he bear it that he looks a veritable Don Caesar who has stepped for an hour from a bygone century. A brown beard covers the lower part of his face; all above is hidden by a black silk mask.

While Louise is taking note of this interesting personality she hears the door open behind her, and turns expecting to greet Mr. Felton or Ashley. Instead a stranger steps rather shakily into the box and closes the door with an affable “Good-evening, mademoiselle.” Louise makes no reply, and her unwelcome visitor drops into a seat with easy familiarity.

“I have been more enthusiastically received to-night, but I will let that pass,” he remarks, with cheerful impudence.

“I do not know you, sir,” says Louise frigidly, as she rises and casts a wildly anxious look over the ball-room.

“Oh, well, I am not so hard to get acquainted with,” offers the insolent mask. “Will you drink a bottle of wine with me?”

“Leave me at once!” commands Louise, pointing to the door with trembling finger.

“By George! That’s an attitude worthy of Lady Macbeth,” remarks his insolence, in frank admiration. “I will go,” he adds, in mock humility, “but I must at least have a kiss to solace me for the loss of your society.”

“You would not dare!” gasps Louise, retreating to the box rail.

“Dare?” laughs his insolence; “I would dare anything for such a prize,” and he approaches her unsteadily.

Louise’s frightened gaze is turned toward the ball-room and again rests upon Don Caesar de Bazan, who, attracted by the colloquy, has stepped a pace out upon the floor and is an interested spectator of the encounter.

“Save me!” she whispers, and sinks upon one knee.

But the entreaty is superfluous. Already Don Caesar’s hands are on the rail and with a vault he is in the box. His arm shoots out and his insolence goes down with a crash. He struggles to his feet with an oath and makes for Don Caesar; but the latter’s threatening attitude, clenched fist and eyes that flash fire through the black mask, cause him to stop, and muttering, “You will hear from me again,” he leaves the box.

Don Caesar lifts his cap and is about to follow, when Louise interrupts him. “Do not go,” she says gratefully, “until I have thanked you a thousand times for the service you have rendered me.”

Don Caesar bows. “As for the service,” he remarks lightly, “it was nothing. The fellow has been drinking, and seeing you alone—”

“My friends have left me only for a few moments,” Louise hastens to explain, as she glances over the floor and bites her lips in vexation.

“Then I may remain until they return?” Don Caesar observes inquiringly, dropping into a chair. “Some other graceless scamp may blunder in here.”

Louise’s eyes express a timid assent to the proposition.

“This is the first of these balls that you have attended?” asks Don Caesar, noting that she is ill at ease.

“Yes; and it will be the last. I had read much of them, how brilliant they were, and all that, and I naturally acquiesced when I was tempted with an invitation. For I was told that if one went masked there was no harm in looking on for an hour.”

“Nor is there. The wickedness will not begin for some time, and it is at best, or worst, a cheap, tawdry wickedness, wholly unattractive to saint or sinner. It is all inexpressibly stupid. A lot of tinsel-decked people rushing hither and thither in the dance, with little regard for the rhythm of the music and less for the etiquette of the ball-room, and a line of weary clubmen, bankers, men-about-town, butchers and bakers and candlestick-makers looking on.”

“Yet you attend, though your remark indicates familiarity with the function.”

“Oh, yes, I attend. For in spite of it all there are flowers and music, light and color and a certain brilliancy that enables one to forget for the nonce the even deadlier stupidity of the outside world.”

“Don Caesar de Bazan of old was not a cynic,” remarks Louise, smilingly.

“Had he been he would not have maintained our evergreen regard. When we sit down to a book or a play we like to leave our cynicism behind us; to live with men who have not a care beyond the morrow; men who mount horse and ride away from their troubles; whose swords leap from their sheaths at the breath of an insult; good, hearty, whole-souled fellows whose fortunes one delights to follow, but whom, alas, we seldom meet in the flesh.”

“Perhaps it is as well. You might grow awfully tired of them.”

“Perhaps. I sometimes think that, outside of the lasting friendships with the people in books and plays, the only satisfactory acquaintances are the chance ones.”

“True,” murmurs Louise, dreamily. She wonders whether the face behind the black mask matches the melody of the voice. A similar thought flits through Don Caesar’s mind, as his eyes take in the graceful figure of the girl, clad all in black, a single ornament fastened at the long white throat.

“I, too, have few friends,” says Louise. “But there is one friend who never fails me, through joy or sadness—my music.”

“Ah, there is naught like it to drive away that enemy to life, dull care,” put in the Don. “It is my one passion. And I have cultivated it only lately. But now I give myself up to it entirely, attending every concert of any repute, and bewailing fate a thousand times that I cannot play, or sing, or write.”

“I think I can guess your favorite melody—one of them, at least.”

“Can you, indeed?” asked Don Caesar, in interested surprise.

“The Sonata Pathetique.”

“Ah, is it not beautiful? You have guessed correctly, but how?”

“You were whistling it softly as you stood near yonder pillar, a moment before the occasion for your presence here arose.”

“Very probably. It is continually running through my head. Do you know, the melody has two meanings to me. When I am out of patience with the world and myself it seems tinged with an inexpressible melancholy. And when I am in good spirits the refrain becomes singing, joyous, triumphant. Has it ever seemed so to you?”

“I do not know. It has always seemed beautiful. It is my favorite.”

“And mine. You are not a New Yorker,” ventures Don Caesar.

“So? It is now my turn, Don Caesar, to marvel at your guessing powers.”

Don Caesar laughs softly. “It does not demand an extraordinary acute discernment. Your accent and manner betoken the New Englander.”

“Are we then so provincial that we so easily betray ourselves? But you are right. I am a Vermonter.”

“I thought so. Odd, is it not, how dominos conduce to confidences, even among strangers?”

“Yes. And yet I think they would prove unsatisfactory for conversational purposes among people who—” Louise pauses.

“People who have been formally introduced, eh?” finishes Don Caesar. “Are you in the city for any length of time?”

“Only until Saturday. We sail for Cuba then.”

“Cuba? That is a long way off,” muses Don Caesar. “I came very near forgetting that I had not been formally introduced and expressing the regret that I should not see you again before you sail.”

“You said a moment ago that the only satisfactory acquaintances were the transitory ones,” Louise reminds him.

“True. But that rule has its exceptions, like all others.”

“Consistency is no more a man’s attribute than a woman’s,” moralizes Miss Hathaway. “My friends approach, Don Caesar,” she adds, as she catches a glimpse of Mr. Felton and Ashley threading their way over the crowded floor.

“That is the signal for my departure, then,” says Don Caesar. “Before I go I would crave one small boon.”

“I owe you some return for your timely assistance. Speak, Don Caesar.”

“Just a glimpse of the face that your mask so jealously veils.”

“Oh!” cries Louise, somewhat disturbed.

“Remember,” urges Don Caesar, “we shall never meet again—But ’twould be ungenerous to press my request,” he adds, rising. “I must say farewell, then, with only the memory of a sweet voice to recall one of the few pleasant quarter-hours that I have known.”

Some impulse, she can hardly explain what, seizes Louise. With trembling fingers she detaches her mask and uncovers a face suffused with blushes.

“I thought so!” murmurs Don Caesar, as his eyes take in the glory of that face, which is almost immediately veiled again.

“Thank you,” he says, simply, and presses to his lips for an instant the hand she timidly gives him in parting.

He is gone, and Louise sinks back into her chair with beating heart, wondering whether she has been foolish, or unmaidenly, or indiscreet. She forgets to administer to Ashley the scolding he deserves for his long absence and receives abstractedly his explanation of a row in the wine-room and their detention by the crowd. Her gaze wanders about the ball-room in search of the graceful figure of Don Caesar de Bazan, but he has vanished.