Hearts and Masks

When they give you a mask at a ball they also give you the key to all

manner of folly and impudence. Even stupid persons become witty, and

the witty become correspondingly daring. For all I knew, the Blue

Domino at my side might be Jones' wife, or Brown's, or Smith's, or even

Green's; but so long as I was not certain, it mattered not in what

direction my whimsical fancy took me. (It is true that ordinarily

Jones and Brown and Smith and Green do not receive invitations to

attend masquerades at fashionable hunt clubs; but somehow they seem to

worry along without these equivocal honors, and prosper. Still, there

are persons in the swim named Johnes and Smythe and Browne and Greene.

Pardon this parenthesis!)

As I recollected the manner in which I had self-invited the pleasure of

my company to this carnival at the Blankshire Hunt Club, I smiled

behind my mask. Nerves! I ought to have been a professor of clinics

instead of an automobile agent. But the whole affair appealed to me so

strongly I could not resist it. I was drawn into the tangle by the

very fascination of the scheme. I was an interloper, but nobody knew

it. The ten of hearts in my pocket did not match the backs of those

cards regularly issued. But what of that? Every one was ignorant of

the fact. I was safe inside; and all that was romantic in my system

was aroused. There are always some guests who can not avail themselves

of their invitations; and upon this vague chance I had staked my play.

Besides, I was determined to disappear before the hour of unmasking. I

wasn't going to take any unnecessary risks. I was, then, fairly secure

under my Capuchin's robe.

Out of my mind slipped the previous adventures of the evening. I

forgot, temporarily, the beautiful unknown at Mouquin's. I forgot the

sardonic-lipped stranger I had met in Friard's. I forgot everything

save the little ticket that had accidentally slipped into my package,

and which announced that some one had rented a blue domino.

And here was a Blue Domino at my side. Just simply dying to have me

talk to her!

"I am madly in love with you," I began. "I have followed you often; I

have seen you in your box at the opera; I have seen you whirl up Fifth

Avenue in your fine barouche; and here at last I meet you!" I clasped

my hands passionately.

"My beautiful barouche! My box at the opera!" the girl mimicked.

"What a cheerful Ananias you are!"