“You’re trying to deceive me,” the woman said, and laughed, and picked up her fluttering play-bill. “No. 5—why, it isn’t a pig at all, it’s whistling.”
“Then, for heaven’s sake, talk to me,” I begged. “Some things I can live through, but fifteen minutes of whistling with no relief—talk to me. It’s life and death.”
“Look at the name,” she answered irrelevantly. “What a queer name—it starts out to be Zoroaster and gets side-tracked. This must be the wonderful whistling Mrs. Schuyler talked about—we must listen—they say it’s the best thing in the evening, and is making a sensation.”
“Let it—I don’t want to hear it,” I answered from a soul immune to vaudeville sensations, and I did not glance at the programme.
A boy came into the box swinging a tray of glasses of ice-water. I took one and held it in my hand as I spoke. At that moment No. 5 began. With a whirl of my chair which made the man next me frown with astonishment, I had twisted toward the stage, the glass crashed to the floor; the water splashed on a velvet gown and I did not see it; I saw only a figure which stood there, alone, by the footlights.
Strong, sweet, the song of the loggers on the River Gatineau rang flute-like through the theatre. The homely words, like meek handmaidens, followed in my mind the melody:
C’était le vingt-cinq de juillet
Lorsque je me suis engagé
Pour monter dans la rivière