On the Watch

False--from the head's crown to the foot's sole--false!
To think I never knew it until now,
Nor saw thro' him e'en when I saw him smile;
Saw that he meant this when he wed me,
When he caressed me! Yes, when he kissed my lips!--BROWNING While this busy scene was being enacted below stairs, equally important,
if quieter dramas were being performed in the dressing-rooms up-stairs,
where the maskers were putting the last finishing touches to their
toilets.

In Mrs. Berners' dressing-room, Sybil, the queen of the festival, was
alone. Mr. Berners, who had assumed the character of "Harold, the last
of the Saxon Kings," had already completed his toilet and gone below
stairs, as he said, to take his place near the door to welcome his
guests as they should enter the drawing-room.

So Sybil was alone in her apartment. She also had just completed her
toilet, and now she stood before the large cheval mirror, surveying the
reflection of her figure from its clear surface, where it looked like a
framed picture.

Ah! far the most beautiful, far the most terrible figure in the
pageantry of the evening would be that of Sybil Berners! She had chosen
for her character the unprecedented part of the impersonation of the
Spirit of Fire. It suited well with her whole nature. She was a true
child of the sun--a fervent Fire Worshipper, if ever there lived one in
a Christian community. And now her costume was but the outward sign of
the inward fervor. Let me try to describe it.