Into this scene of revelry, while it is yet early, before the music has reached its wildest strains, and the dancing its giddiest whirl, comes a smart servant girl, leading by the hand a child of four or five summers, a dainty fair-haired creature. In her fairy costume of white satin with its silvery frost work and gleaming pearls; with her gossamer wings and glittering aureole of spun gold; her dainty wand and childish grace,[65] she is the loveliest sight in the midst of all that loveliness, for no disfiguring mask hides the beautiful, eager face that gazes down the long vista of decorated drawing rooms, library, music room, boudoir, in wondering, half frightened expectation. [65] “They’re beginning to dance down there,” says the maid, drawing the child toward a lofty archway, through which they can watch the swiftly whirling figures of the dancers. “Why, do come along, Miss Daisy; one would think your Pa’s house was full of bears and wild-cats, to see your actions.” But the child draws back and grasps fearfully at the skirts of her attendant. “What makes ’em look so queer, Millie? Isn’t you afraid?” “Why no, Miss Daisy. There’s nothing to be afraid of. See; all these funny-looking people are your papa’s friends, and your new mamma’s, and your uncle Alan’s. Look, now,”—drawing the reluctant child forward,—“just look at them! There goes a—a Turk, I guess, and—” “What makes they all have black things on their faces, Millie?” “Why, child, that’s the fun of it all. If it wasn’t for them masks everybody would know everybody else, and there wouldn’t be no masquerade.” “No what?” “No masquerade, child. Now look at that; there goes a pope, or a cardinal; and there, oh my! that must be a Gipsy—or an Injun.” “A Gipsy or an Indian; well done, Millie, ha ha ha!” At the sound of these words they turn swiftly. A tall masker, in a black and scarlet domino, is standing just behind them, and little Daisy utters one frightened cry and buries her face in Millie’s drapery. [66]“Why, Daisy;” laughs the masker; “little Daisy, are you frightened? Come, this will never do.” [66]
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