Helia and her “Professor”
Phil went on his way through Paris and London and across the ocean to New York, and then on to the sunny South and his old ancestral mansion on the Chesapeake. But nothing, neither terrapin-catching nor duck-shooting nor horseback-riding through the country, could efface his childhood’s first love, which only grew in solitude. How he regretted that he had not taken part in the game when the little Helia invited him with a smile—that he had not kissed her through her brown curls!
Phil came back to France to go on with his studies. Helia was already a grown girl when he saw her again. The circus was being advertised, and great posters with the name of Helia placarded the walls.
With what impatience Phil awaited her! He was to see her again. He passed hours in the open square where the circus was being set up in the disorder of wagons and poles and canvas, peering anxiously into the circus-wagons.
The circus was in a single tent. The artistes for changing their costumes had rude dressing-rooms amid the confusion of circus properties underneath the benches on which the public sat.
One evening Helia had finished dressing by the light of a candle when she heard a noise above her head. She saw the bunting beneath the benches lifted, and a little bunch of flowers fell on her shoulder. She nearly cried out with surprise. During her turn they often threw oranges and flowers to her—that was commonplace; but these flowers!
As soon as she came into the ring she looked at the benches above her dressing-room. She fancied she recognized there the one whom she had seen when she was playing Wolf—how long ago!
“Le Roy fait battre le tambour