Eugene Vickery’s heart was set aswing at the glimpse of Sheila Kemble. The sight of her name on the program had revived his boyhood memories of her. He rose to protest against the hazing of a young girl, especially one whose tradition was so sweet in his remembrance, but he was in the back of the house and his cry of “Shame!” was lost in the uproar, merely adding to it instead of quelling it.
Bret Winfield in a stage box had seen Sheila in the wings for some minutes before her entrance. He knew nothing of her except that her beauty pleased him thoroughly and that he was sorry to see how scared she was when she retreated.
He saw also how plucky she was, for, angered by the boorish unchivalry of the mob, she marched forth again like a young Amazon. At the full sight of her the Freshmen united in a huge noise of kisses and murmurs of, “Yum-yum!” and cries of, “Me for Claribel!” “Say, that’s some gal!” “Name and address, please!” “I saw her first!” “Second havers!” “Mamma, buy me that!” She was called a peach, a peacherino, a pippin, a tangerine, a swell skirt—anything that occurred to the uninspired.
Sheila felt as if she were struck by a billow. Her own color swept past the bounds of the stationary blushes she had painted on her cheeks. She came out again and began her line: “Oh, auntie—”
It was as if echo had gone into hysterics. Two hundred voices mocked her: “Oh, auntie!” “Oh, auntie!” “Oh, auntie!”
She wanted to laugh, she wanted to cry, she wanted to run, she wanted to fight. She wished that the whole throng had but one ear, that she might box it.
The stage-manager was shrieking from the wings: “Go on! Don’t stop for anything!”
She continued her words with an effect of pantomime. The responses were made against a surf of noise.
Then Eric Folwell, who played the hero, came on. He was handsome, and knew it. He was a trifle over-graceful, and his evening coat fitted his perfect figure almost too perfectly. He was met with pitiless implications of effeminacy. “Oh, Clarice!” “Say, Lizzie, are you busy?” “Won’t somebody slap the brute on the wrist?” “My Gawd! ain’t he primeval?” “Oh, you cave-girl!”
As if this were not shattering enough, some of the students had provided themselves with bags of those little torpedoes that children throw on the Fourth of July. One of these exploded at Folwell’s feet. At the utterly unexpected noise he jumped, as a far braver man might have done, taken thus unawares.