Chapter Chapter 18 · THE AWAKENING

. THE AWAKENING

“Do you know,” said Climene, “that I am waiting for the explanation

which I think you owe me?”

They were alone together, lingering still at the table to which

Andre-Louis had come belatedly, and Andre-Louis was loading himself a

pipe. Of late--since joining the Binet Troupe--he had acquired the habit

of smoking. The others had gone, some to take the air and others, like

Binet and Madame, because they felt that it were discreet to leave

those two to the explanations that must pass. It was a feeling that

Andre-Louis did not share. He kindled a light and leisurely applied it

to his pipe. A frown came to settle on his brow.

“Explanation?” he questioned presently, and looked at her. “But on what

score?”

“On the score of the deception you have practised on us--on me.”

“I have practised none,” he assured her.

“You mean that you have simply kept your own counsel, and that in

silence there is no deception. But it is deceitful to withhold facts

concerning yourself and your true station from your future wife. You

should not have pretended to be a simple country lawyer, which, of

course, any one could see that you are not. It may have been very

romantic, but... Enfin, will you explain?”

“I see,” he said, and pulled at his pipe. “But you are wrong, Climene.

I have practised no deception. If there are things about me that I have

not told you, it is that I did not account them of much importance.

But I have never deceived you by pretending to be other than I am. I am

neither more nor less than I have represented myself.”

This persistence began to annoy her, and the annoyance showed on her

winsome face, coloured her voice.

“Ha! And that fine lady of the nobility with whom you are so intimate,

who carried you off in her cabriolet with so little ceremony towards

myself? What is she to you?”

“A sort of sister,” said he.

“A sort of sister!” She was indignant. “Harlequin foretold that you

would say so; but he was amusing himself. It was not very funny. It

is less funny still from you. She has a name, I 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 she 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 yourself 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 café 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 café.

“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, O 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 a 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.