suppose, this sort of sister?"
     "Certainly she has a  name. She is Mlle.  Aline de Kercadiou, the niece
of Quintin de Kercadiou, Lord of Gavrillac."
     "Oho! That's  a sufficiently fine  name for your sort  of sister.  What
sort of sister, my friend?"
     For the first time in their relationship he observed  and  deplored the
taint of vulgarity, of shrewishness, in her manner.
     "It would have been more accurate in  me to have said a sort of reputed
left-handed cousin."
     "A  reputed left-handed cousin! And what  sort of relationship may that
be? Faith, you dazzle me with your lucidity."
     "It requires to be explained."
     "That is what I have been telling you. But you seem very reluctant with
your explanations."
     "Oh, no. It is only that they are so unimportant. But be you the judge.
Her  uncle,  M. de  Kercadiou, is  my godfather,  and  she  and I have  been
playmates  from  infancy as  a consequence.  It  is  popularly  believed  in
Gavrillac that  M. de Kercadiou is my father. He has certainly cared  for my
rearing from my tenderest years, and it is entirely owing to him  that I was
educated  at  Louis  le Grand. I  owe  to him  everything that I have -  or,
rather, everything  that  I had;  for of my own free  will I have cut myself
adrift, and to-day I possess nothing save what I  can earn for myself in the
theatre or elsewhere."
     She sat stunned and pale under  that cruel  blow to her swelling pride.
Had he told  her  this but yesterday, it  would have made no impression upon
her,  it  would  have mattered not  at all;  the event of to-day coming as a
sequel would but have  enhanced him  in her eyes.  But coming now, after her
imagination had woven for him so magnificent a  background, after the rashly
assumed discovery of  his  splendid identity had  made her the envied of all
the company,  after  having  been in her  own  eyes and theirs  enshrined by
marriage with  him  as a great lady,  this disclosure crushed and humiliated
her.  Her prince in disguise  was merely  the outcast  bastard of a  country
gentleman! She would  be the laughing-stock of every member of her  father's
troupe,  of  all  those who had so  lately  envied  her this  romantic  good
fortune.
     "You should have told me this before,"  she said, in a  dull voice that
she strove to render steady.
     "Perhaps I should. But does it really matter?"
     "Matter?" She  suppressed  her fury  to  ask another question. "You say
that  this  M. de  Kercadiou is popularly believed to  be your father.  What
precisely do you mean?"
     "Just that. It is a  belief that I  do  not  share. It is  a matter  of
instinct,  perhaps,  with  me.  Moreover,  once  I  asked  M.  de  Kercadiou
point-blank, and I received from him a denial.  It is not, perhaps, a denial
to  which one would attach too much importance in all the circumstances. Yet
I have never known M de Kercadiou for other than  a man of strictest honour,
and I should hesitate to disbelieve him
     -  particularly when  his statement  leaps  with  my own instincts.  He
assured me that he did not know who my father was."
     "And your mother,  was he equally ignorant?" She was  sneering, but  he
did not remark it. Her back was to the light.
     "He would not disclose  her name  to me. He confessed her to be a  dear
friend of his."
     She startled him by laughing, and her laugh was not pleasant.
     "A very dear friend, you  may be sure, you simpleton. What name do  you
bear?"
     He restrained his own rising indignation to answer her question calmly:
"Moreau. It was given me, so I am told, from the Brittany village in which I
was born.  But I have  no claim to it. In fact I have no name,  unless it be
Scaramouche, to  which I have earned a title. So that  you see, my dear," he
ended with a smile, "I have practised no deception whatever."
     "No, no. I see  that now." She laughed without mirth,  then drew a deep
breath and rose. "I am very tired," she said.
     He was on his feet in an  instant,  all solicitude.  But she waved  him
wearily back.
     "I think I will  rest until it is time to go to the theatre." She moved
towards  the door, dragging her feet a little. He sprang to open it, and she
passed out without looking at him.
     Her  so  brief romantic  dream was ended. The  glorious  world of fancy
which in the last hour she had built with such elaborate  detail, over which
it should be her  exalted destiny to rule, lay shattered about her feet, its
debris so many stumbling-blocks that prevented her from  winning back to her
erstwhile content in Scaramouche as he really was.
     Andre-Louis  sat in the  window embrasure, smoking and looking idly out
across the river.  He  was intrigued and meditative. He had shocked her. The
fact was clear; not  so the  reason. That he should confess himself nameless
should not particularly injure him  in the eyes of a girl  reared  amid  the
surroundings that  had been  Climene's. And yet that  his confession had  so
injured him was fully apparent.
     There, still at his  brooding, the returning Columbine discovered him a
half-hour later.
     "All alone, my prince!" was her laughing greeting, which suddenly threw
light upon his mental  darkness. Climene had been disappointed of hopes that
the wild imagination of these players had suddenly erected upon the incident
of his meeting with Aline. Poor child! He smiled whimsically at Columbine.
     "I am likely to be so for some little time," said he, "until it becomes
a commonplace that I am not, after all, a prince.
     "Not a prince? Oh, but a duke, then - at least a marquis."
     "Not even a chevalier, unless it be  of the order of fortune. I am just
Scaramouche. My castles are all in Spain."
     Disappointment clouded the lively, good-natured face.
     "And I had imagined you... "
     "I know," he interrupted. "That is the mischief." He might  have gauged
the extent of that mischief  by Climene's conduct that  evening  towards the
gentlemen of fashion who clustered now in the green-room between the acts to
pay their  homage to the  incomparable amoureuse.  Hitherto she had received
them with a circumspection compelling respect. To-night she  was  recklessly
gay, impudent, almost wanton.
     He spoke of it gently to her as  they walked home together, counselling
more prudence in the future.
     "We are not married yet," she told him, tartly. "Wait until then before
you criticize my conduct."
     "I trust that there will be no occasion then," said he.
     "You trust? Ah, yes. You are very trusting."
     "Climene, I have offended you. I am sorry."
     "It is  nothing," said she.  "You  are what you are. Still  was  he not
concerned.  He  perceived the  source of her ill-humour; understood,  whilst
deploring  it; and, because he  understood, forgave.  He perceived also that
her ill-humour  was shared by her father, and by this he was frankly amused.
Towards M.  Binet  a tolerant  contempt was the only feeling  that  complete
acquaintance could beget. As for the rest of the company, they were disposed
to be very kindly towards Scaramouche. It was almost as if in reality he had
fallen from the high estate to which their own  imaginations had raised him;
or  possibly it  was because they saw  the effect  which that fall from  his
temporary and fictitious elevation had produced upon Climene.
     Leandre alone made himself an exception. His habitual melancholy seemed
to  be   dispelled  at  last,  and  his  eyes  gleamed  now  with  malicious
satisfaction  when  they  rested  upon  Scaramouche,  whom  occasionally  he
continued to address with sly mockery as "mon prince."
     On the morrow Andre-Louis  saw but little  of Climene. This was  not in
itself extraordinary, for he was very hard at work again, with  preparations
now for "Figaro-Scaramouche" which was to  be  played on  Saturday. Also, in
addition to  his manifold  theatrical occupations,  he  now devoted an  hour
every morning to the study of fencing  in an academy of arms. This  was done
not only to  repair an omission in his education, but  also, and chiefly, to
give  him  added grace and  poise  upon the  stage. He found his  mind  that
morning distracted by thoughts of both  Climene and Aline. And oddly  enough
it  was Aline  who provided the  deeper  perturbation. Climene's attitude he
regarded as  a passing phase  which need  not seriously  engage him. But the
thought of  Aline's conduct towards him kept rankling, and still more deeply
rankled the thought of her possible betrothal to M. de La Tour d'Azyr.
     This it  was that brought forcibly to his  mind the self-imposed but by
now half-forgotten  mission that he had made his own. He had boasted that he
would make the voice  which M. de La Tour  d'Azyr had sought to silence ring
through the length and breadth of the land. And what had he done of all this
that he had boasted? He had incited  the mob of Rennes and the mob of Nantes
in such  terms  as poor Philippe might have employed,  and then because of a
hue  and cry he had fled like a  cur and taken shelter in  the first  kennel
that offered,  there  to lie  quiet and  devote himself  to  other things  -
self-seeking  things.  What  a  fine  contrast  between the promise  and the
fulfilment!
     Thus Andre-Louis to himself in his self-contempt. And whilst he trifled
away his time and played Scaramouche, and centred all his hopes in presently
becoming the rival of such men as Chenier and Mercier, M. de  La Tour d'Azyr
went his proud ways unchallenged and wrought his  will. It was idle  to tell
himself that the seed he had sown was bearing fruit. That the demands he had
voiced in Nantes  for the Third Estate had been granted by M. Necker, thanks
largely to the  commotion which his anonymous speech had made. That  was not
his concern or his  mission. It was no part  of his concern to set about the
regeneration of mankind, or even the regeneration of the social structure of
France. His  concern  was to  see  that  M. de La Tour d'Azyr  paid  to  the
uttermost  liard for the brutal wrong he  had done Philippe de Vilmorin. And
it did not increase his self-respect to find that the danger in  which Aline
stood of being married to  the Marquis was the real spur  to his rancour and
to  remembrance  of his vow. He  was  - too  unjustly, perhaps - disposed to
dismiss  as  mere sophistries  his own  arguments that  there was nothing he
could do;  that, in fact, he had but to  show his head to find himself going
to Rennes  under arrest and making his  final exit from the world's stage by
way of the gallows.
     It is impossible to read that part of his "Confessions" without feeling
a  certain pity  for him. You realize what must have been his state of mind.
You realize what a prey he was to emotions  so conflicting, and  if you have
the imagination that will enable you to put yourself  in his place, you will
also realize how impossible was any  decision  save the one to which he says
he came, that he would move,  at the  first moment that he perceived in what
direction it would serve his real aims to move.
     It happened that the first person he saw when he took the stage on that
Thursday evening was Aline;  the second was the Marquis de La  Tour  d'Azyr.
They occupied a box on the right of, and immediately above, the stage. There
were  others  with them  - notably a  thin,  elderly, resplendent lady  whom
Andre-Louis supposed to be Madame la Comtesse de Sautron. But at the time he
had no eyes for  any but those two, who of late had so haunted his thoughts.
The sight of either of  them would have been sufficiently disconcerting. The
sight of both together very nearly made him  forget the purpose for which he
had come  upon  the stage. Then he pulled himself  together,  and played. He
played,  he says, with  an unusual nerve, and never  in  all  that brief but
eventful career of his was he more applauded.
     That was the evening's first shock. The next came after the second act.
Entering the green-room he found it more thronged than usual, and at the far
end with Climene, over whom  he was  bending from his fine height,  his eyes
intent  upon  her face, what time  his smiling lips moved in talk, M. de  La
Tour d'Azyr. He had  her entirely to himself, a privilege none of the men of
fashion  who  were in the habit of visiting the coulisse  had  yet  enjoyed.
Those  lesser gentlemen  had all  withdrawn before the Marquis,  as  jackals
withdraw before the lion.
     Andre-Louis  stared  a  moment,  stricken.  Then  recovering  from  his
surprise he became critical  in his study of the Marquis. He considered  the
beauty  and  grace and splendour  of him, his courtly air,  his complete and
unshakable self-possession. But more than  all he  considered the expression
of the dark eyes that were devouring Climene's lovely face, and his own lips
tightened.
     M.  de La  Tour d'Azyr  never heeded him or his stare; nor, had he done
so, would he  have known  who  it was that looked  at him  from  behind  the
make-up of Scaramouche; nor, again, had  he known, would he have been in the
least troubled or concerned.
     Andre-Louis sat down apart, his mind in  turmoil. Presently  he found a
mincing  young gentleman  addressing him,  and  made shift to  answer as was
expected.  Climene having been thus sequestered, and Columbine being already
thickly besieged by gallants, the lesser visitors had to  content themselves
with Madame and  the  male members of the troupe. M. Binet,  indeed, was the
centre of a gay cluster that shook with laughter at  his sallies.  He seemed
of  a sudden  to  have emerged from the gloom of the last two days into high
good-humour,  and  Scaramouche  observed  how  persistently  his  eyes  kept
flickering upon his daughter and her splendid courtier.
     That night  there, were high words between Andre-Louis and Climene, the
high  words  proceeding  from  Climene.  When  Andre-Louis  again,  and more
insistently, enjoined prudence upon  his betrothed, and begged her to beware
how far  she  encouraged the advances of such a man as M. de La Tour d'Azyr,
she became  roundly abusive. She shocked and stunned  him by her  virulently
shrewish tone, and her still more unexpected force of invective.
     He  sought to  reason with her, and  finally  she came to certain terms
with him.
     "If you have become betrothed to me  simply to stand as an obstacle  in
my path, the sooner we make an end the better."
     "You do not love me then, Climene?"
     "Love  has  nothing to do  with  it. I'll  not tolerate  your insensate
jealousy.  A girl in the theatre must make it her business  to accept homage
from all."
     "Agreed; and there is no harm, provided she gives nothing in exchange."
     White-faced, with flaming eyes she turned on him at that.
     "Now, what exactly do you mean?"
     "My meaning is clear.  A  girl in  your  position may  receive all  the
homage that is offered, provided she receives it with  a dignified aloofness
implying  clearly  that she has no favours  to  bestow  in return beyond the
favour of her smile. If  she is  wise  she will see to it that the homage is
always offered collectively  by her admirers, and that no single one amongst
them shall ever have the privilege of approaching her alone. If she is  wise
she  will  give no encouragement, nourish no hopes that it may afterwards be
beyond her power to deny realization."
     "How? You dare?"
     "I  know  my world. And  I know M. de La Tour d'Azyr," he answered her.
"He is a  man without charity, without humanity almost; a man who takes what
he wants wherever he finds  it  and whether  it is given willingly or not; a
man who reckons nothing of the misery he scatters on his self-indulgent way;
a man  whose only law is force. Ponder it, Climene, and ask yourself if I do
you less than honour in warning you."
     He went out on that, feeling a degradation in continuing the subject.
     The days that followed  were unhappy days for him, and for at least one
other.  That other was Leandre, who  was cast into the profoundest dejection
by M. de La Tour d'Azyr's assiduous attendance upon Climene. The Marquis was
to be seen at every performance; a box was perpetually reserved for him, and
invariably he came either alone or else with his cousin M. de Chabrillane.
     On Tuesday of the following week, Andre-Louis went  out alone  early in
the  morning.  He was  out of  temper,  fretted by an  overwhelming sense of
humiliation,  and  he hoped  to  clear  his mind  by walking. In turning the
corner   of   the  Place   du  Bouffay   he  ran  into   a  slightly  built,
sallow-complexioned  gentleman  very  neatly dressed  in  black,  wearing  a
tie-wig under a  round hat. The  man fell back at sight of  him, levelling a
spy-glass, then hailed him in a voice that rang with amazement.
     "Moreau! Where the devil have you been hiding your-self these months?"
     It was Le Chapelier, the lawyer,  the leader of the Literary Chamber of
Rennes.
     "Behind the skirts of Thespis," said Scaramouche.
     "I don't understand."
     "I  didn't intend that you should. What of yourself, Isaac? And what of
the world which seems to have been standing still of late?"
     "Standing still!" Le Chapelier laughed. "But where have you been, then?
Standing still!" He pointed across  the square to a caf‚ under the shadow of
the gloomy prison. "Let us  go and drink a bavaroise. You are of all men the
man we want, the man we have been  seeking everywhere, and - behold!  -  you
drop from the skies into my path."
     They crossed the square and entered the caf‚.
     "So  you  think the  world has been  standing  still! Dieu  de  Dieu! I
suppose you haven't heard  of the  royal order  for the  convocation of  the
States General, or the terms of them - that we are to have what we demanded,
what you demanded for  us here in  Nantes! You haven't heard that  the order
has gone forth for  the primary elections  - the elections of the  electors.
You haven't heard of the fresh uproar in  Rennes, last month. The order  was
that  the three  estates should  sit together  at the  States General of the
bailliages,  but  in  the  bailliage  of  Rennes  the  nobles  must ever  be
recalcitrant. They  took up arms actually  - six hundred of them with  their
valetaille, headed by  your  old friend M. de La Tour d'Azyr,  and they were
for slashing us - the members of the  Third  Estate - into ribbons  so as to
put an end to our insolence." He laughed delicately. "But, by God, we showed
them that we, too, could take up arms.  It  was what you yourself  advocated
here  in  Nantes,  last November.  We  fought them  a pitched battle  in the
streets, under the leadership of your namesake Moreau, the provost,  and  we
so peppered  them that  they  were  glad to take  shelter  in  the Cordelier
Convent. That is the end of their resistance to the royal authority  and the
people's will."
     He ran on at great speed detailing the events that had taken place, and
finally came to the matter which had, he announced, been causing him to hunt
for Andre-Louis until he had all but despaired of finding him.
     Nantes was  sending fifty delegates to the assembly of Rennes which was
to  select  the  deputies  to  the  Third Estate  and edit  their  cahier of
grievances. Rennes  itself  was  being  as  fully  represented, whilst  such
villages  as  Gavrillac were  sending two  delegates  for every two  hundred
hearths or less.  Each of these three had  clamoured that Andre-Louis Moreau
should be  one of its delegates. Gavrillac wanted him because he belonged to
the  village,  and it  was  known  there what sacrifices he had  made in the
popular  cause; Rennes wanted him because it  had heard his spirited address
on  the day  of  the  shooting of the students;  and  Nantes -  to  whom his
identity was  unknown - asked for him as the speaker who had  addressed them
under the name of Omnes Omnibus and  who  had framed for  them the  memorial
that was believed so largely to have influenced M. Necker in formulating the
terms of the convocation.
     Since he could not be found,  the delegations  had been made up without
him.  But  now it happened that one  or  two  vacancies had occurred in  the
Nantes representation;  and it was  the business  of filling these vacancies
that had brought Le Chapelier to Nantes.
     Andre-Louis firmly shook his head in answer to Le Chapelier's proposal.
     "You  refuse?" the  other  cried. "Are  you mad?  Refuse,  when you are
demanded from so  many sides?  Do  you realize that it is more than probable
you will be elected one of the deputies, that you will be sent to the States
General at Versailles to represent us in this work of saving France?"
     But  Andre-Louis, we know,  was  not  concerned to save  France. At the
moment he was concerned to save two women, both of whom he loved, though  in
vastly different ways, from a man he had vowed to ruin. He stood firm in his
refusal until Le Chapelier dejectedly abandoned the attempt to persuade him.
     "It is  odd,"  said Andre-Louis,  "that  I  should have been so  deeply
immersed  in  trifles  as  never  to  have perceived  that  Nantes is  being
politically active."
     "Active! My friend, it is a seething cauldron of political emotions. It
is kept quiet on the surface only by the persuasion that all goes well. At a
hint to the contrary it would boil over."
     "Would it  so?" said Scaramouche,  thoughtfully. "The knowledge may  be
useful."  And  then he changed the subject. "You know that La Tour d'Azyr is
here?"
     "In Nantes? He has  courage if he shows himself. They are not a  docile
people,  these  Nantais, and they know his record and  the part he played in
the rising  at  Rennes.  I  marvel they haven't  stoned him. But  they will,
sooner or later. It only needs that some one should suggest it."
     "That is  very  likely," said Andre-Louis, and smiled. "He doesn't show
himself  much;  not in the streets, at least. So that he has not the courage
you  suppose; nor any kind of  courage,  as  I  told him once.  He  has only
insolence."
     At parting Le Chapelier again exhorted  him to  give thought to what he
proposed.  "Send  me word if you change  your mind. I am lodged at the Cerf,
and  I shall be here  until the day  after to-morrow. If you have  ambition,
this is your moment."
     "I have no ambition, I suppose," said Andre-Louis, and went his way.
     That night at the theatre he  had a mischievous impulse to test what Le
Chapelier had told him of the state of public feeling in the city. They were
playing "The Terrible Captain," in the last act of which the empty cowardice
of the bullying braggart Rhodomont is revealed by Scaramouche.
     After the laughter which the exposure of the roaring captain invariably
produced, it remained for  Scaramouche  contemptuously to  dismiss him  in a
phrase that varied nightly, according to the inspiration of the moment. This
time he chose to give his phrase a political complexion:
     "Thus, 0 thrasonical coward, is your emptiness exposed. Because of your
long  length and the great sword you carry  and  the angle at which you cock
your hat,  people have  gone in  fear of you,,  have believed  in  you, have
imagined  you to  be  as terrible and as  formidable as you  insolently make
yourself  appear. But at the first touch  of true spirit you crumple up, you
tremble, you whine pitifully, and the great  sword remains in your scabbard.
You remind me of the Privileged Orders when confronted by the Third Estate."
     It was audacious  of him, and  he  was prepared for anything - a laugh,
applause, indignation, or all together.  But  he  was not prepared for  what
came. And it came so suddenly and spontaneously from the groundlings and the
body of those in the amphitheatre that he was almost scared by it - as a boy
may  be  scared who has held  a  match  to a sun-scorched hayrick. It was  a
hurricane of furious applause. Men leapt to their feet, sprang  up on to the
benches,  waving their hats in the air,  deafening  him  with  the  terrific
uproar of their acclamations. And it rolled  on and on, nor ceased until the
curtain fell.
     Scaramouche stood  meditatively smiling  with  tight lips.  At the last
moment he had caught a glimpse of M. de La Tour d'Azyr's face thrust farther
forward than usual from the shadows of  his box, and  it  was a  face set in
anger, with eyes on fire.
     "Mon Dieu!" laughed Rhodomont, recovering from the real scare that  had
succeeded his histrionic terror,  "but you have  a  great trick of  tickling
them in the right place, Scaramouche."
     Scaramouche  looked up  at  him  and  smiled.  "It can  be  useful upon
occasion," said he, and went off to his dressing-room to change.
     But a  reprimand awaited him. He was delayed  at the theatre by matters
concerned with the  scenery of the  new  piece they were  to mount upon  the
morrow. By the  time he was rid of the business the rest of the  company had
long since left.  He called a chair and had himself carried back to the  inn
in  solitary state.  It was one of  many  minor  luxuries his  comparatively
affluent present circumstances permitted.
     Coming into  that  upstairs room  that was common to all the troupe, he
found M. Binet talking loudly and vehemently. He  had caught sounds  of  his
voice whilst  yet upon the stairs. As  he entered Binet broke off short, and
wheeled to face him.
     "You are here  at  last!" It was so odd a greeting that Andre-Louis did
no more than look his mild  surprise. "I  await  your  explanations  of  the
disgraceful scene you provoked to-night."
     "Disgraceful? Is it disgraceful that the public should applaud me?"
     "The public? The  rabble, you mean.  Do you want  to deprive  us of the
patronage of all gentlefolk  by vulgar appeals  to the  low  passions of the
mob.?"
     Andre-Louis stepped past M. Binet and forward to the table. He shrugged
contemptuously. The man offended him, after all.
     "You exaggerate grossly - as usual."
     "I do not exaggerate.  And I am the master  in my  own theatre. This is
the Binet Troupe, and it shall be conducted in the Binet way."
     "Who are the gentlefolk the loss of whose patronage to the  Feydau will
be so poignantly felt?" asked Andre-Louis.
     "You imply that  there are none? See how wrong you are.  After the play
to-night M. le Marquis de La Tour d'Azyr came to me, and spoke to me  in the
severest terms  about your scandalous outburst.  I was  forced to apologize,
and... "
     "The  more fool you,"  said Andre-Louis. "A man  who respected  himself
would  have  shown  that gentleman  the  door."  M.  Binet's  face  began to
empurple. "You call  yourself the  head of the  Binet Troupe, you boast that
you will be master in your own theatre, and you  stand like a lackey to take
the orders of the first insolent fellow who comes to your green-room to tell
you that he does not  like a line spoken by one of your company! I say again
that had you really respected yourself you would have turned him out."
     There  was  a  murmur of approval from several members of  the company,
who, having heard the arrogant tone assumed by the Marquis, were filled with
resentment against the slur cast upon them all.
     "And  I say further,"  Andre-Louis went on,  "that a  man  who respects
himself,  on  quite other grounds, would  have  been only too  glad  to have
seized this pretext to show M. de La Tour d'Azyr the door."
     "What  do you  mean by that?" There was a  rumble  of  thunder  in  the
question.
     Andre-Louis'   eyes  swept   round   the  company   assembled   at  the
supper-table. "Where is Climene?" he asked, sharply.
     Leandre leapt  up to answer him, white in the face, tense and quivering
with excitement.
     "She left  the  theatre  in the Marquis de  La  Tour d'Azyr's  carriage
immediately  after the performance. We heard him offer to  drive her to this
inn."
     Andre-Louis  glanced  at the timepiece  on  the  overmantel. He  seemed
unnaturally calm.
     "That would be an hour ago - rather more. And she has not yet arrived?"
     His eyes sought M. Binet's. M. Binet's eyes eluded his glance. Again it
was Leandre who answered him.
     "Not yet."
     "Ah!" Andre-Louis sat down,  and  poured  himself  wine.  There was  an
oppressive silence in the room. Leandre watched  him  expectantly, Columbine
commiseratingly.  Even M.  Binet  appeared  to  be  waiting for  a  cue from
Scaramouche. But Scaramouche disappointed him. "Have you left me anything to
eat?" he asked.
     Platters were pushed towards him. He helped himself calmly to food, and
ate in silence, apparently with a good  appetite. M. Binet  sat down, poured
himself  wine, and  drank. Presently  he attempted to make conversation with
one and another. He was answered curtly,  in monosyllables. M. Binet did not
appear to be in favour with his troupe that night.
     At long length  came a rumble of wheels  below and a rattle  of halting
hooves. Then voices, the high, trilling laugh  of Climene floating  upwards.
Andre-Louis went on eating unconcernedly.
     "What an actor!" said Harlequin  under his breath to Polichinelle,  and
Polichinelle nodded gloomily.
     She came in,  a leading  lady taking the stage,  head high, chin thrust
forward,  eyes  dancing with  laughter; she expressed triumph and arrogance.
Her  cheeks  were  flushed,  and there  was some  disorder  in  the mass  of
nut-brown hair  that crowned her  head. In  her  left  hand she  carried  an
enormous bouquet of white camellias. On its middle finger a diamond of great
price drew almost at once by its effulgence the eyes of all.
     Her  father sprang  to  meet  her with an  unusual display  of paternal
tenderness. "At last, my child!"
     He conducted her to the table. She sank into a chair, a little wearily,
a little nervelessly,  but  the smile did  not leave her face, not even when
she glanced  across  at  Scaramouche.  It  was  only Leandre, observing  her
closely, with  hungry, scowling stare, who detected something as  of fear in
the hazel eyes momentarily seen between the fluttering of her lids.
     Andre-Louis, however, still went on eating stolidly, without so much as
a look in  her direction. Gradually the company came to realize that just as
surely as  a scene was  brooding, just so surely  would there be no scene as
long as they remained. It was Polichinelle, at  last, who gave the signal by
rising and withdrawing, and within two minutes none remained in the room but
M. Binet, his daughter, and Andre-Louis. And  then, at last, Andre-Louis set
down knife and  fork, washed his  throat with a draught of Burgundy, and sat
back in his chair to consider Climene.
     "I trust," said he, "that you had a pleasant ride, mademoiselle."
     "Most  pleasant,  monsieur.  Impudently   she  strove  to  emulate  his
coolness, but did not completely succeed.
     "And not unprofitable, if  I may judge that jewel  at this distance. It
should be worth at least a couple of hundred louis, and that is a formidable
sum even to  so  wealthy  a nobleman as M. de La  Tour  d'Azyr.  Would it be
impertinent in one  who has had some notion of becoming your husband, to ask
you, mademoiselle, what you have given him in return?"
     M.  Binet  uttered a  gross  laugh,  a  queer  mixture  of cynicism and
contempt.
     "I have given nothing," said Climene, indignantly.
     "Ah! Then the jewel is in the nature of a payment in advance."
     "My God, man, you're not decent!" M. Binet protested.
     "Decent?"  Andre-Louis' smouldering  eyes  turned to  discharge upon M.
Binet  such  a  fulmination  of  contempt  that the  old  scoundrel  shifted
uncomfortably in his chair. "Did you mention decency, Binet? Almost you make
me lose my temper,  which is a thing that I detest above all others!" Slowly
his  glance  returned to Climene, who sat with elbows on the table, her chin
cupped  in  her  palms, regarding  him  with  something  between  scorn  and
defiance.  "Mademoiselle," he said, slowly, "I desire you purely in your own
interests to consider whither you are going."
     "I am well able to consider it for myself, and to decide without advice
from you, monsieur."
     "And now you've got your answer," chuckled Binet. "I hope you like it."
     Andre-Louis  had paled a  little; there  was  incredulity in  his great
sombre eyes as they continued steadily to regard her. Of M. Binet he took no
notice.
     "Surely, mademoiselle, you cannot mean  that willingly,  with open eyes
and a  full  understanding of what you do, you would  exchange an honourable
wifehood for... for the thing that such men as M. de La Tour d'Azyr may have
in store for you?"
     M. Binet made a wide gesture, and swung to his daughter. "You hear him,
the mealy-mouthed prude!  Perhaps you'll believe  at last that marriage with
him  would  be the  ruin of you. He  would always be  there the inconvenient
husband - to mar your every chance, my girl."
     She tossed her lovely head  in  agreement with  her father  "I begin to
find him tiresome with his silly jealousies," she confessed. "As a husband I
am afraid he would be impossible."
     Andre-Louis felt a constriction of the heart. But - always the  actor -
he showed nothing of it. He laughed a little, not very pleasantly, and rose.
     "I bow to your choice, mademoiselle. I pray that you may not regret it"
     "Regret  it?"  cried M.  Binet.  He was  laughing, relieved to  see his
daughter at last  rid of  this suitor of whom  he had never  approved, if we
except those few hours when he really  believed him  to  be  an eccentric of
distinction. "And what shall she regret? That she accepted the protection of
a nobleman so powerful and wealthy  that  as a mere  trinket he  gives her a
jewel worth as much as an actress earns in a year at the Comedie Francaise?"
He got  up, and advanced towards Andre-Louis. His mood became  conciliatory.
"Come, come, my friend, no  rancour now. What the devil! You wouldn't  stand
in  the girl's way? You can't really blame her  for making this choice? Have
you thought what it means to her? Have you thought that under the protection
of such a gentleman there are no heights which she may not reach? Don't  you
see  the wonderful  luck  of it? Surely, if you're fond of her, particularly
being of a jealous temperament, you wouldn't wish it otherwise?"
     Andre-Louis looked at him in silence for a long moment. Then he laughed
again. "Oh, you are fantastic," he said. "You are  not real."  He turned  on
his heel and strode to the door.
     The action, and  more the contempt of his look, laugh, and  words stung
M. Binet to passion, drove out the conciliatoriness of his mood.
     "Fantastic,  are  we?"  he  cried,  turning  to  follow  the  departing
Scaramouche  with  his  little  eyes  that  now   were  inexpressibly  evil.
"Fantastic that we  should  prefer the  powerful  protection  of this  great
nobleman to marriage with beggarly, nameless bastard. Oh, we are fantastic!"
     Andre-Louis turned, his hand upon the door-handle. No," he said, "I was
mistaken. You are not  fantastic.  You are just vile - both of you."  And he
went out.

        CHAPTER X. CONTRITION


     Mlle. de Kercadiou walked with her  aunt in the bright morning sunshine
of a Sunday in March on the broad terrace of the Chateau de Sautron.
     For  one of  her natural sweetness of  disposition she  had been  oddly
irritable  of late,  manifesting  signs  of  a  cynical  worldliness,  which
convinced Mme. de  Sautron  more  than  ever that  her  brother  Quintin had
scandalously conducted the child's education. She appeared to  be instructed
in all the things  of which a girl is  better ignorant, and ignorant  of all
the things that a  girl should know. That at least  was the point of view of
Mme. de Sautron.
     "Tell  me, madame,"  quoth  Aline, "are  all  men beasts?"  Unlike  her
brother, Madame la Comtesse  was tall  and majestically built.  In  the days
before her marriage with  M. de Sautron,  ill-natured folk  described her as
the only  man in the family. She looked down now  from her noble height upon
her little niece with startled eyes.
     "Really, Aline, you have a trick of asking the  most disconcerting  and
improper questions."
     "Perhaps it is because I find life disconcerting and improper.
     "Life? A young girl should not discuss life."
     "Why not,  since  I  am  alive?  You  do  not  suggest  that  it  is an
impropriety to be alive?"
     "It is an impropriety for  a young unmarried  girl  to seek to know too
much  about life. As for your absurd  question about  men, when I remind you
that man  is the  noblest  work of  God,  perhaps you will consider yourself
answered."
     Mme. de Sautron did not invite a pursuance of the subject. But Mlle. de
Kercadiou's outrageous rearing had made her headstrong.
     "That  being so," said she,  will  you tell me  why  they find  such an
overwhelming attraction in the immodest of our sex?"
     Madame  stood still and raised shocked  hands. Then she looked down her
handsome, high-bridged nose.
     "Sometimes   -  often,  in   fact,  my  dear  Aline  -  you   pass  all
understanding.  I shall write to Quintin that the sooner you are married the
better it will be for all."
     "Uncle Quintin has left that matter to my own deciding," Aline reminded
her.
     "That," said  madame  with complete  conviction, "is the last  and most
outrageous of his  errors. Who ever heard of a girl being left to decide the
matter  of her own  marriage?  It is... indelicate  almost to expose  her to
thoughts of such things." Mme. de Sautron shuddered. "Quintin is a boor. His
conduct  is  unheard  of. That  M.  de La  Tour d'Azyr should parade himself
before you so that  you may make up your mind whether he  is the proper  man
for you!" Again she shuddered.  "It is of  a grossness, of... of a prurience
almost... Mon Dieu! When I married your uncle, all this was arranged between
our  parents. I first saw him when he came to  sign  the contract. I  should
have  died of  shame  had it  been otherwise. And that is how  these affairs
should be conducted."
     "You are no doubt right, madame. But  since that is not how my own case
is being conducted, you will forgive me if I deal with it apart from others.
M.  de La  Tour d'Azyr desires to marry me. He has been permitted to pay his
court. I should be glad to have him informed that he may cease to do so."
     Mme. de  Sautron stood still, petrified  by  amazement.  Her  long face
turned white; she seemed to breathe with difficulty.
     "But.., but.. what are you saying?" she gasped.
     Quietly Aline repeated her statement.
     "But this is outrageous! You cannot be permitted to play fast-and-loose
with  a gentleman of M.  le Marquis' quality! Why, it is little more  than a
week since you permitted him to be informed that you would become his wife!"
     "I did  so in  a moment of... rashness. Since then M. le  Marquis'  own
conduct has convinced me of my error."
     "But  - mon  Dieu!"  cried the Countess.  "Are you  blind  to the great
honour that is being paid you? M. le Marquis will make you the first lady in
Brittany. Yet, little fool  that you are, and greater  fool that Quintin is,
you trifle with  this  extraordinary  good fortune!  Let me  warn  you." She
raised an admonitory forefinger. "If  you continue in this stupid  humour M.
de La Tour d'Azyr  may definitely withdraw his offer and depart in justified
mortification."
     "That, madame, as I am endeavouring to convey to you,  is  what  I most
desire."
     "Oh, you are mad."
     "It may  be, madame, that I  am sane in preferring to  be guided  by my
instincts. It may be  even that I am justified in resenting that the man who
aspires  to  become  my husband  should  at the  same  time  be paying  such
assiduous homage to a wretched theatre girl at the Feydau."
     "Aline!"
     "Is it not true? Or perhaps you do not find  it strange  that M. de  La
Tour d'Azyr should so conduct himself at such a time?"
     "Aline, you are so extraordinary a mixture. At moments you shock me  by
the indecency of your expressions; at others you  amaze  me by the excess of
your  prudery. You have been brought up like  a  little bourgeoise, I think.
Yes, that is  it  - a little  bourgeoise. Quintin was always something of  a
shopkeeper at heart."
     "I  was  asking  your opinion  on the conduct of M. de La  Tour d'Azyr,
madame. Not on my own."
     "But it is an  indelicacy in you to observe such things.  You should be
ignorant of them, and I can't think  who is so... so unfeeling as to  inform
you. But  since you  are informed, at  least you should be modestly blind to
things  that  take  place  outside  the... orbit  of  a  properly  condu