“Oh!” Jeanne’s breath came short and quick. Her wild heartbeats of anticipation had not been in vain.
“But the company!” she exclaimed in a low whisper. “Shall they know?”
“They will not be told. Many will guess that something unusual is happening. But they all are good sports. And besides they are all of my—what is it you have called it?—my ‘Golden Circle.’”
“Yes, yes, your ‘Golden Circle.’”
“And those of our ‘Golden Circle’ never betray us. It is an unwritten law.”
“Ah!” Jeanne breathed deeply. “Can I do it?”
“Certainly you can. And perhaps, on the very next night when the ‘Juggler’ is done—oh, well, you know.”
“Yes. I know.” Jeanne was fairly choking with emotion.
When, however, half an hour later, garbed as the juggler with his hoop and his bag of tricks, she came before the troop of French villagers of the drama, she was her own calm self. For once again as in a dream, she trod the streets of a beautiful French village. As of yore she danced before the boisterous village throng.
Only now, instead of stick and bear, she danced with hoop and bag.