“It is nothing,” she insisted stoutly, “and I shall dance to-night as never before!”
Jimmy was ready, later, to testify that she carried out this promise to herself.
“Like some divine one,” was the way he expressed it. “I tell you,” he fairly stammered in his enthusiasm, “you could see her floating about like a ghost on that dark old stage!”
Once her feet began their tapping, Jeanne thought only of the Fire God and her art. Gone were thoughts of rushing wings and crashing glass, of darkness and the terror that lurks in the night.
Gone, too, was the shabby old playhouse with its dingy drapes and tarnished gilt. She seemed not there at all. In spirit she found herself beside a roadway at the edge of a pleasant village in France. It was springtime. The scent of apple blossoms was in the air. The dwarf pear trees that grew so close against the wall, were green with new leaves. The gypsies were about her, they and the country folk. Bihari was sawing at his violin. Jaquis was strumming a guitar and she was dancing bare-foot on the soft grass of spring, while the eyes of the Fire God gleamed softly upon her. It was all so like a dream that she wished it might last forever.
Slowly there drifted into that dream a sound. At first she thought it was only a part of the dream, the clap of night hawks’ wings as they circled in the moonlight.
“But no!” Her face went white. “It is the wings, the fluttering of wings!” She almost cried aloud.
At the same instant she became conscious of some presence among the shadows that circled her on every side.
Panic seized her. She wanted to run away; yet she dared not. Close about her was Jimmie’s friendly circle of light. Beyond that was what? She dared not stir from that circle.
Suddenly her dancing ceased. Standing there alone in that sea of darkness, she stretched slim arms high, and cried: