And so Larry Beers brought his swami and dervish to the Ames mansion, and caused his hostess to be well advertised in the newspapers the following day. And he caused the eyes of Carmen to bulge, and her thought to swell with wonder, as she gazed. And he caused the bepowdered nose of Mrs. Hawley-Crowles to stand a bit closer to the perpendicular, while she sat devising schemes to cast a shade over this clumsy entertainment.
The chief result was that, a week later, Mrs. Hawley-Crowles, still running true to form, retorted with a superb imitation of the French Bal de l’Opéra, once so notable under the Empire. The Beaubien had furnished the inspiring idea––and the hard cash.
“I wonder why I do it?” that woman had meditated. “Why do I continue to lend her money and take her notes? I wanted to ruin her, at first. I don’t––I don’t seem to feel that way now. Is it because of Carmen? Or is it because I hate that Ames woman so? I wonder if I do still hate her? At any rate I’m glad to see Carmen oust the proud hussy from her place. It’s worth all I’ve spent, even if I burn the notes I hold against Jim Crowles’s widow.”
And often after that, when at night the Beaubien had sought her bed, she would lie for hours in the dim light meditating, wondering. “It’s Carmen!” she would always conclude. “It’s Carmen. She’s making me over again. I’m not the same woman I was when she came into my life. Oh, God bless her––if there is a God!”
The mock Bal de l’Opéra was a magnificent fête. All the members of the smart set were present, and many appeared in costumes representing flowers, birds, and vegetables. Carmen went as a white rose; and her great natural beauty, set off by an exquisite costume, made her the fairest flower of the whole garden. The Duke of Altern, costumed as a long carrot, fawned in her wake throughout the evening. The tubbily girthy Gannette, dressed to represent a cabbage, opposed her every step as he bobbed before her, showering his viscous compliments upon the graceful creature. Kathleen Ames appeared as a bluebird; and she would have picked the fair white rose to pieces if she could, so wildly jealous did she become at the sight of Carmen’s further triumph.
About midnight, when the revelry was at its height, a door at the end of the hall swung open, and a strong searchlight was turned full upon it. The orchestra burst into the wailing dead march from Saul, and out through the glare of light stalked the giant form of J. Wilton Ames, gowned in dead black to represent a King Vulture, and with a blood-red fez surmounting his cruel mask. As he stepped out upon the platform which had been constructed to represent the famous bridge in “Sumurun,” and strode toward the main floor, a murmur involuntarily rose from the assemblage. It was a murmur of awe, of horror, of fear. The “monstrum horrendum” of Poe was descending upon them in the garb which alone could fully typify the character of the man! When he reached the end of the bridge the huge creature stopped and distended his enormous sable wings.
“Good God!” cried Gannette, as he thought of his tremendous financial obligations to Ames.
Carmen shuddered and turned away from the awful spectacle. “I want to go,” she said to the petrified Mrs. Hawley-Crowles, who had known nothing of this feature of the program.
Straight to the trembling, white-clad girl the great, black vulture stalked. The revelers fell away from him on either side as he approached. Carmen turned again and watched him come. Her face was ashen. “God is everywhere,” she murmured.