And she was dancing for them now.
Her soft, short curls all fluttering, her cheeks all bright with a
scarlet flush, her eyes as black as night and full of fire; her gay
little uniform, with its scarlet and purple, making her look like a
fuchsia bell tossed by the wind to and fro, ever so lightly, on its
delicate, swaying stem; Cigarette danced with the wild grace of an
Almeh, of a Bayadere, of a Nautch girl--as untutored and instinctive
in her as its song to a bird, as its swiftness to a chamois. To see
Cigarette was like drinking light, fiery wines, whose intoxication was
gay as mischief, and sparkling as themselves. All the warmth of Africa,
all the wit of France, all the bohemianism of the Flag, all the caprices
of her sex, were in that bewitching dancing. Flashing, fluttering,
circling, whirling; glancing like a saber's gleam, tossing like a
flower's head, bounding like an antelope, launching like an arrow,
darting like a falcon, skimming like a swallow; then for an instant
resting as indolently, as languidly, as voluptuously, as a water-lily
rests on the water's breast--Cigarette en Bacchante no man could resist.
When once she abandoned herself to the afflatus of the dance delirium,
she did with her beholders what she would. The famous Cachucha,
that made the reverend cardinals of Spain fling off their pontifical
vestments and surrender themselves to the witchery of the castanets and
the gleam of the white, twinkling feet, was never more irresistible,
more enchanting, more full of wild, soft, bizarre, delicious grace.
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