THE THEATRICALS.
A very mixed audience filled to overflowing the town-hall of Montfield. In the front-seats, which had been cleverly reserved for them by a small advance in price, were seated the élite of the village, complacently chatting together of the weather, the exhibition, their servants, and such small gossip as serves to savor the somewhat insipid existence of a country village. Behind these sat the farmers with their wives and daughters; the former regarding the curtain with a species of awe, while the latter indulged in clumsy flirtations with the rustic swains, who offered them delicate attentions in the shape of lozenges and peanuts. The talk here among the elders was chiefly of the crops and of cattle; while the youths and maidens speculated, giggling, upon the prospects of a dancing-school for the winter.
The relatives of the performers were chiefly in the reserved seats, and exhibited more or less nervousness according to their temperaments; all alike, however, endeavoring the most preternatural semblance of indifference.
"I have half regretted," Miss Tabitha Mullen remarked to Dr. Sanford, next whom she chanced to be seated, "that I allowed Ease to take part in this. It scarcely seems the thing with such a mixed audience. But all her associates were concerned in it, and I did not wish to seem over particular."
"You mustn't be too strict with Ease," Mrs. Sanford began to reply for her husband, when the tinkling of a bell announced the rise of the curtain, and she left her remark unfinished.
The young people of Montfield were accustomed at intervals to give theatrical performances, finding this the easiest method of raising funds for charitable purposes. They had accumulated quite a respectable collection of scenery and stage-properties, all more or less primitive, but answering sufficiently well for their purposes. "The Faithful Jewess" required chiefly forest scenery; and of this they possessed quite a variety, amateur talent being apt to run to the rustic drama. The tragedy proceeded smoothly enough, the back-seats understanding little of it, but liking it rather better on that account, besides being amused by the costumes and the high-sounding blank verse. Mr. Putnam was certainly not an accomplished actor; but of a part like that of the patriarch he made as much as the character would admit. The scenes between himself and Patty were really impressive, and won the admiration even of Miss Mullen, who prided herself upon her taste, and was nothing unless critical.
It is probable that both actors played the better for the presence of a deep feeling towards each other. The lawyer was conscious of a thrill whenever his hand touched hers; and, if Patience was less moved, it was because she was more truly an actor, and more completely identified with her part.
At the later rehearsals the young lady had ignored the presence of any misunderstanding between herself and her lover, and had been outwardly her usual self, bright and gay. She had avoided any approach to sentiment, alike with Toxteth and with Putnam. She had given herself up to the arrangements for the exhibition, attending to those thousand details of which no one else ever thought. She enjoyed the excitement, and that most seductive of all forms of flattery, the self-consciousness of being a motive-power and a leader. She had put aside every thing else to be thought of and met after this evening; and the feverish excitement arising from this undercurrent of feeling buoyed her up to-night.
Her dress, setting off her fine form to advantage, was in color and arrangement admirably adapted to her beauty, and never had she looked so superbly handsome. No wonder that to-night her lovers were more deeply enamoured than ever.
Among her lovers, be it said here, was no longer to be numbered Burleigh Blood. The transfer of his allegiance to Flossy Plant, which Patty had first attempted in half-jest, had become deep earnest; and the giant was the humble slave of the little lady he might almost have balanced upon his extended palm.