“Alas and alack! and in all Hampshire how am I to find my lady’s window?”
“If I let fall that secret, will you let fall your mask?” Aureole looked meaningly at the strip of black velvet which concealed the upper portion of his face.
“Give me but a chance!” And with that the Troubadour passed on, between the benches, and back to the platform.
Aureole began to scribble feverishly on the back of her programme, which she then folded into a note.
“Take this round to the tenor of the quartette,” she commanded little Verney; “hurry up, or they’ll be gone,” for the spectators were already beginning to stir and disperse in the darkness, and the flaming footlights had one by one been extinguished. Verney obediently went. The missive ran as follows:
“Will you not stay your caravan an hour or two, and with your companions, give me the pleasure of your company this evening at my house by the pine trees? Sans cérémonie—for are we not fellow-gipsies on the highway of Art?
“Lady Auburn-hair.
“P.S—Tout passe, tout casse, tout lasse.”
Tim Jones, Ferdinand Wagge, Billy Dawson, and Bertram Kyndersley, reading this effusion behind their shabby drapery of green baize which did duty for a curtain, were mightily amused at the fellow-gipsies on the highway of Art; and in the hope that the house by the pine trees might at least be productive of decent whisky and cigars, fervidly accepted the invitation.
“S’pose the postscript is her telegraphic address?” hazarded Billy Dawson, knitting his brows. “More like the ’phone number,” from Ferdinand Wagge.