e maskers' costumes, the
tinkle of music, and the echoing strains of songs. Up to her ears
there floated the laughter of the older maskers, and the screams of the
little children frightened at their own images under the mask and
domino. What a hurry to be out and in the motley merry throng, to be
pacing Royal Street to Canal Street, where was life and the world!

They were tired eyes with which Odalie looked at the gay pageant at
last, tired with watching throng after throng of maskers, of the
unmasked, of peering into the cartsful of singing minstrels, into
carriages of revellers, hoping for a glimpse of Pierre the devout. The
allegorical carts rumbling by with their important red-clothed horses
were beginning to lose charm, the disguises showed tawdry, even the
gay-hued flags fluttered sadly to Odalie.

Mardi Gras was a tiresome day, after all, she sighed, and Tante Louise
agreed with her for once.

Six o'clock had come, the hour when all masks must be removed. The
long red rays of the setting sun glinted athwart the many-hued costumes
of the revellers trooping unmasked homeward to rest for the night's
last mad frolic.

Down Toulouse Street there came the merriest throng of all. Young men
and women in dainty, fairy-like garb, dancers, and dresses of the
picturesque Empire, a butterfly or two and a dame here and there with
powdered hair and graces of olden time. Singing with unmasked faces,
they danced toward Tante Louise and Odalie. She stood with eyes
lustrous and tear-heavy, for there in the front was Pierre, Pierre the
faithless, his arms about the slender waist of a butterfly, whose
tinselled powdered hair floated across the lace ruffles of his Empire
coat.

"Pierre!" cried Odalie, softly. No one heard, for it was a mere faint
breath and fell unheeded. Instead the laughing throng pelted her with
flowers and candy and went their way, and even Pierre did not see.

You see, when one is shut up in the grim walls of a Royal Street house,
with no one but a Tante Louise and a grim judge, how is one to learn
that in this world there are faithless ones who may glance tenderly
into one's eyes at mass and pass the holy water on caressing fingers
without being madly in love? There was no one to tell Odalie, so she
sat at home in the dull first days of Lent, and nursed her dear dead
love, and mourned as women have done from time immemorial over the
faithlessness of man. And when one day she asked that she mig