The Ghost | Page 5

mauve.
"Emmeline, this is Carl," Sullivan whispered.
She smiled faintly, giving me her finger-tips, and then she suddenly
took a step forward as if the better to examine my face. Her strange
eyes met mine. She gave a little indefinable unnecessary "Ah!" and
sank down into a chair, loosing my hand swiftly. I was going to say that
she loosed my hand as if it had been the tail of a snake that she had
picked up in mistake for something else. But that would leave the
impression that her gesture was melodramatic, which it was not. Only
there was in her demeanor a touch of the bizarre, ever so slight; yes, so
slight that I could not be sure that I had not imagined it.
"The wife's a bit overwrought," Sullivan murmured in my ear. "Nerves,
you know. Women are like that. Wait till you're married. Take no
notice. She'll be all right soon."
I nodded and sat down. In a moment the music had resumed its sway
over me.
I shall never forget my first sight of Rosetta Rosa as, robed with the
modesty which the character of Elsa demands, she appeared on the
stage to answer the accusation of Ortrud. For some moments she
hesitated in the background, and then timidly, yet with what grandeur
of mien, advanced towards the king. I knew then, as I know now, that
hers was a loveliness of that imperious, absolute, dazzling kind which
banishes from the hearts of men all moral conceptions, all
considerations of right and wrong, and leaves therein nothing but
worship and desire. Her acting, as she replied by gesture to the question
of the king, was perfect in its realization of the simplicity of Elsa.
Nevertheless I, at any rate, as I searched her features through the
lorgnon that Mrs. Sullivan had silently handed to me, could descry

beneath the actress the girl--the spoilt and splendid child of Good
Fortune, who in the very spring of youth had tasted the joy of sovereign
power, that unique and terrible dominion over mankind which belongs
to beauty alone.
Such a face as hers once seen is engraved eternally on the memory of
its generation. And yet when, in a mood of lyrical and rapt ecstasy, she
began her opening song, "In Lichter Waffen Scheine," her face was
upon the instant forgotten. She became a Voice--pure, miraculous,
all-compelling; and the listeners seemed to hold breath while the
matchless melody wove round them its persuasive spell.
* * * * *
The first act was over, and Rosetta Rosa stood at the footlights bowing
before the rolling and thunderous storms of applause, her hand in the
hand of Alresca, the Lohengrin. That I have not till this moment
mentioned Alresca, and that I mention him now merely as the man who
happened to hold Rosa's hand, shows with what absolute sovereignty
Rosa had dominated the scene. For as Rosa was among sopranos, so
was Alresca among tenors--the undisputed star. Without other aid
Alresca could fill the opera-house; did he not receive two hundred and
fifty pounds a night? To put him in the same cast as Rosa was one of
Cyril Smart's lavish freaks of expense.
As these two stood together Rosetta Rosa smiled at him; he gave her a
timid glance and looked away.
When the clapping had ceased and the curtain hid the passions of the
stage, I turned with a sigh of exhaustion and of pleasure to my hostess,
and I was rather surprised to find that she showed not a trace of the
nervous excitement which had marked her entrance into the box. She
sat there, an excellent imitation of a woman of fashion, languid,
unmoved, apparently a little bored, but finely conscious of doing the
right thing.
"It's a treat to see any one enjoy anything as you enjoy this music," she
said to me. She spoke well, perhaps rather too carefully, and with a hint

of the cockney accent.
"It runs in the family, you know, Mrs. Smith," I replied, blushing for
the ingenuousness which had pleased her.
"Don't call me Mrs. Smith; call me Emmeline, as we are cousins. I
shouldn't at all like it if I mightn't call you Carl. Carl is such a
handsome name, and it suits you. Now, doesn't it, Sully?"
"Yes, darling," Sullivan answered nonchalantly. He was at the back of
the box, and clearly it was his benevolent desire to give me fair
opportunity of a tête-à-tête with his dark and languorous lady.
Unfortunately, I was quite unpractised in the art of maintaining a
tête-à-tête with dark and languorous ladies. Presently he rose.
"I must look up Smart," he said, and left us.
"Sullivan has been telling me about you. What a strange meeting! And
so you are a