Afterward came the great feature and surprise of the day: a number of tableaux—scenes from old ballads and folk-tales, long known to the imaginations of the people, but here enacted before their eyes by the young folks in beautiful costumes.
Fult sang the ballads and, at the proper time, the curtains were drawn back and the scenes revealed. There were two from "Barbara Allen," three from "Jackaro," and two from "Turkish Lady"; the latter being especially striking, with Darcy Kent as the noble English captive and Charlotta Fallon as the Turkish Lady who sets him free and afterward follows him to his castle in England, where all ends happily.
Last came two incidents from "Lord Lovel" (this ballad was sung by Charlie, not by Fult). The hero, bound "strange countries for to see," bids farewell to the lovely Lady Nancibelle, and rides away on his milk-white steed (only it had to be changed to "coal-black," being Fult's mare, with Fult as rider). He returns, after a year and a day of wandering, to find the people all gathered around the bier of Lady Nancibelle, who has pined away and died of longing for him; and thereupon he himself dies of a broken heart. Annette took the part of the "lovely Lady Nancibelle," and Fult was beautiful in the velvet clothes and plumed hat of Lord Lovel.
Then followed several folk-tales, done by the children: Red Riding-Hood, Cinderella, and Blue-beard, the tales being told by Amy as the scenes were given.
And now came the surprise of the occasion—no one had known of it but Isabel and the performers: two tableaux from "The Sleeping Beauty."
The curtain opened with the young princess, under the spell of the wicked fairy, lying asleep, surrounded by the court people, and the king and queen on their thrones, all likewise sleeping. Lethie, in a rich robe of pink satin, with her pale golden hair falling over the dark velvet couch, was very lovely. But it was in the second scene, where the prince (Ronald Kent, a younger brother of Giles, a beautiful dark-eyed stripling) enters the court, kisses the princess, raises her to her feet, and leads her forward, that Lethie's full loveliness broke upon the assembly.
Standing there, the golden veil of her hair streaming down from a coronet of pearls over the rich, flowing folds of satin, her bare neck and arms white as their strings of pearls, her pale cheeks for once pink with excitement, her large eyes starry, her lips gravely smiling, she was a vision of delight. Women, children, men gazed spellbound. Never had they seen, or imagined, anything to compare with this. Her beauty was of the kind that brings tears to the eyes, a pang to the heart, because of its very perfection. And a spiritual quality shone through the fleshly vessel as a clear light in a vase of alabaster. People asked themselves if it were possible this was their Lethie; or was it in truth a fairy princess, a creature not of this earth?
Hidden behind the curtain, Isabel watched their faces, and particularly one face, that of Fult. Still wearing his velvet clothes and plumed hat, he stood near one side of the platform, his gaze fixed upon Lethie, in utter surprise and bewilderment; it was as if for the first time he really saw her. Then he leaned forward, to see better. Then he turned and saw the whole assembly hanging rapt upon her beauty. Then he looked again, excitedly, delightedly, with a proud air of proprietorship. His face flushed when he saw that Ronald continued to hold her hand.
Isabel remembered Cynthia Fallon's words,—"Hit's allus the newest face with them,"—and realized that she herself had been but an episode in Fult's life; that this wonderful new Lethie, superimposed upon the old, was the girl who, if any girl could, would hold Fult's wild heart.
When the curtain was at last drawn over Lethie's loveliness, and the stage cleared, Amy and Virginia rose from the bench where they sat with Aunt Ailsie, and mounted the platform to say a few words of farewell to the people.