What a night!
In his half-sleep he thought he was still at the Quat’z-Arts Ball, from which he had just come; he still heard the murmuring noise of the multitude, like the prolonged “moo-o-o” of oxen in the stable; and there still moved before his eyes the restless throng, masked in the skins of beasts or trailing gilt-embroidered mantles.
His dreaming had the sharp relief of life; but it was the car on which Helia was drawn—Helia the circus-girl, the little friend of his boyhood, whom he had not seen for so long and whom he found here with surprise—it was this car, with the superb figure of Helia at its summit, which eclipsed all the rest.
The car itself was an attention of Phil’s friends. They had chosen for its subject the personages of the “Fata Morgana”—a great decorative picture which Phil was finishing for the Duke of Morgania.
Helia, upright at the very summit of the car, like an idol at the pinnacle of a temple, personified Morgana, the fairy, the saint, the legendary Queen of the Adriatic. Lower down, seated at the four corners, Thilda, Marka, Rhodaïs the slave, and Bertha the Amazon—the four heroines of Morgania—kept watch and ward over their queen.
The car, drawn by knights, advanced amid hushed admiration. Helia seemed to float above the sea of heads, and behind her the great hall was ablaze with lights.
Phil, dozing in his arm-chair, saw himself, clad in his magnificent Indian costume, marching at the head of the car, brandishing his tomahawk in honor of Morgana. Then, at the breaking up of the cortège when the procession was over, there were the supper-tables taken by storm amid cries and laughter.
And the feast began.
Helmets and swords ceased to shine. Hands laid down battle-axes to wield knives and forks; warriors fell upon the food as they might have done after a night of pillage. Each man kissed his fair neighbor. Poufaille, the sculptor, disguised as the prehistoric man, put his hairy muzzle against the rosy cheeks of Suzanne, his model. Close at hand, Phil, the Indian chief, seated at the table of the Duke of Morgania, talked with Helia of old times, of the strolling circus in which he had known her, of their meeting in her dressing-room below the benches; and he said to her in a low voice: