“Fair Fatality, indeed!” cried Kitty. “And her so young and handsome, and not a six months famous yet.”
“Oh, she’s a cunning piece!” interposed Molly. “I have heard tales of her ways. They say none knows where she lives, nor where she comes from, nor her real name. She wraps herself in the utmost mystery. Probably,” went on the little lady, with her acid titter, “’tis some grocer’s daughter! But poor simplicity has no chance, especially with the gentlemen. You must play the romantick.”
My Lady Kilcroney, her fingers to her lips, seemed lost in reflection.
“Was there not a story of a duel, Mr. Stafford?”
“A duel, Madam? Five, to my certain knowledge,” asseverated the Beau. “And all with more or less serious results.”
“Pshaw, ’tis like an Italian tale of the evil eye!” Nan shuddered. “I’ll not go to Drury Lane and come under it, ’tis pos! Pray, Miss Pounce? Oh, no, not green! Green! Am I never to get away from it?”
Miss Falcon’s fame did not suffer from the double tragedy of which she had been so singularly the cause. She withdrew from the programmes for a week after the funerals of the two unfortunate noblemen, and then reappeared, to play to houses more crowded, more enthusiastic than ever. The wild rumours which began to circulate about her only served to increase the public frenzy.
Pamela Pounce, much occupied with the Walsingham mourning, was for some time unable to gratify her desire to see Fair Fatality act once more; a desire which—so far was she from sharing Lady Anne Day’s fears—had now indeed become a kind of obsession. When circumstances permitted her at last to indulge herself, she purchased a ticket in the forefront of the gallery, and prepared to enjoy a couple of hours complicated emotion. To her amazement, at the end of the second act a note was handed to her:
“I have just seen your kind face. Will you be a Friend to me to-night, and come back with me to my house? If you can do me this favour—my heart tells me you will—meet me at the stage door after the last act.