the action, was Kishwegin. And her dark
_braves_ seemed to become darker, more secret, malevolent, burning
with a cruel fire, and at the same time wistful, knowing their end.
Ciccio laughed in a strange way, as he wrestled with the bear, as he
had never laughed on the previous evenings. The sound went out into
the audience, a soft, malevolent, derisive sound. And when the bear
was supposed to have crushed him, and he was to have fallen, he
reeled out of the bear's arms and said to Madame, in his derisive
voice:

"Vivo sempre, Madame." And then he fell.

Madame stopped as if shot, hearing his words: "I am still alive,
Madame." She remained suspended motionless, suddenly wilted. Then
all at once her hand went to her mouth with a scream:

"The Bear!"

So the scene concluded itself. But instead of the tender,
half-wistful triumph of Kishwegin, a triumph electric as it should
have been when she took the white man's hand and kissed it, there
was a doubt, a hesitancy, a nullity, and Max did not quite know what
to do.

After the performance, neither Madame nor Max dared say anything to
Ciccio about his innovation into the play. Louis felt he had to
speak--it was left to him.

"I say, Cic'--" he said, "why did you change the scene? It might
have spoiled everything if Madame wasn't such a genius. Why did you
say that?"

"Why," said Ciccio, answering Louis' French in Italian, "I am tired
of being dead, you see."

Madame and Max heard in silence.

When Alvina had played _God Save the King_ she went round behind the
stage. But Ciccio and Geoffrey had already packed up the property,
and left. Madame was talking to James Houghton. Louis and Max were
busy together. Mr. May came to Alvina.

"Well," he said. "That closes another week. I think we've done very
well, in face of difficulties, don't you?"

"Wonderfully," she said.

But poor Mr. May spoke and looked pathetically. He seemed to feel
forlorn. Alvina was not attending to him. Her eye was roving. She
took no notice of him.

Madame came up.

"Well, Miss Houghton," she said, "time to say good-bye, I suppose."

"How do you feel after dancing?" asked Alvina.

"Well--not so strong as usual--but not so bad, you know. I shall be
all right--thanks to you. I think your father is more ill than I. To
me he looks very ill."

"Father wears himself away," said Alvina.

"Yes, and when we are no longer young, there is not so much to wear.
Well, I must thank you once more