Astrid wore her light blue domino with coquettish grace and the small white loup hardly disguised her features; she had not yet pulled up the hood, and her fair hair curled prettily over her small head. Ragna also wore a _loup_, a black velvet one: she wished now that she had chosen a mask like Estelle's--anything to hide her, for her chin would quiver in spite of all her efforts.
Fru Bjork followed the girls into the room, very imposing in heliotrope, and grumbling at the necessity of wearing a mask.
"So hot! So stuffy! I can't breathe now, and I imagine what it will be in that place!" She was already fanning herself vigorously. "I'm quite as excited as you girls! Dear me, I hope it will be all just right--I should be more comfortable though, I admit, if we had a gentleman with us."
"You might have asked the man with the striped trousers, Mother,--I should think those stripes would carry him through anything!"
"Why should you make fun of the poor man?" asked Estelle. "I am sure he has been most polite. He has taken a great deal of trouble in inquiring about singing lessons for me, and he sings so sweetly himself. Didn't you like that song of his last evening about some '_Paese lontano dal mar_'?"
"But his trousers drown it!" laughed Astrid. "Come on, all of you, it is time to start!"
Fru Bjork led the way, burly in her domino, Estelle after her, and the other two followed, Astrid keeping up a gay chatter which saved Ragna the effort of conversation. They packed themselves into the waiting carriage, and in a few minutes alighted at the Costanzi.
It was early as yet and the crowd was thin, but more people were arriving all the time, some in fancy costume, but most of them in dominoes. Fru Bjork marshalled her party to the box she had taken,--it was in the second tier, near the stage, and there was a table in it as they were to have supper served from Aragno's. Estelle and Astrid pressed to the front of the box, and Ragna sat down on the little bench at the side, behind Astrid.
"Why, Ragna, child," said Fru Bjork, "don't you want to see what's going on, now you're here?"
"I am still a little tired," she answered, "and there is not much to see now, by and by it will be more interesting."