sorrow," was, on his first attempt, fraught with exceeding discord,
and he was preparing once more to assault the citadel of grief,
entrenched with bristling high notes, when an abrupt knocking at the
door, followed by the appearance of a face marred by wrath and adorned
with an enormous pair of whiskers, interrupted his attack.

"Sair," said this person, excitedly, with no more than his head in the
room, like a Punch and Judy figure peering from behind a curtain, "you
are ze one gran' nuisance! Eet is zat--what you call eet?--whistle! I
am crazee--crazee!"

"Yes; you look it!" replied Straws, sympathetically. "Perhaps, if you
had a keep--"

"I am not crazee!" vociferated the man.

"No? Perhaps I could tell better, if I could see more of you. Judging
from the sample, I confess to curiosity for a full-length view. If you
will step in--"

"I will not step in! I will step out! I will leave zis house! I will
leave--forever!"

And the head vanished as suddenly as it had appeared, to be followed
by hasty footsteps down the stairway.

"Now I can understand why Orpheus was torn to pieces," ruminated
Straws, mournfully surveying the offending pipe. "He played on the
lyre! Return to thy cupboard, O reed divine!"--putting the whistle back
in the box--"a vile world, as Falstaff says! Heigho!"--yawning--"life
is an empty void--which reminds me I have a most poetic appetite. What
shall I do"--and Straws sat up relinquishing his lounging attitude--"go
out, or have pot-luck in the room? Tortier's bouillabaisse would about
tickle the jaded palate. A most poetic dish, that bouillabaisse!
Containing all the fish that swim in the sea and all the herbs that grow
on the land! Thus speaks gluttony! Get thee behind me, odoriferous
temptation of garlic! succulent combination of broth and stew!"

So saying, Straws sprang from his bed, lighted a charcoal fire in his
tiny grate; rummaged a bureau drawer and drew forth an end of bacon, a
potato or two, a few apples, an onion and the minor part of a loaf of
bread, all of which, except the bread, he sliced and thrust
indiscriminately into the frying-pan and placed over the blue flame.
Next from behind the mirror he produced a diminutive coffee pot into
which he measured, with extreme care, just so much of the ground
berry, being rather over-nice about his demitasse. Having progressed
thus far in his preparation for pot, or frying-pan luck--and indeed it
seemed a matter of luck, or good fortune, how that mixture would turn
out--he rapped on the floor with the heel of his boot, like the prince
in the fairy tale, summoning his attendant good genii, and in a few
moments a light tapping on the door announced the coming of a
servitor.

Not a mighty wraith nor spook of Arabian fancy, but a very small girl,
or child, with very black hair, very white skin and very dark,
beautiful eyes. A daughter of mixed ancestry, yet with her dainty
hands and little feet, she seemed descended from sprites or sylphs.

"Monsieur called," she said in her pretty dialect.

"Yes, my dear. Go to Monsieur Tortier's, Celestina, and tell him to
give you a bottle of the kind Monsieur Straws always takes."

"At once, Monsieur," she answered, very gravely, very seriously. And
Celestina vanished like a butterfly that flutters quickly away.

"Now this won't be bad after all," thought Straws, sniffing at the
frying-pan which had begun to sputter bravely over the coals, while
the coffee pot gave forth a fragrant steam. "A good bottle of wine
will transform a snack into a collation; turn pot-luck into a feast!"

As thus he meditated the first of night's outriders, its fast-coming
shadows, stole through the window; following these swift van-couriers,
night's chariot came galloping across the heavens; in the sky several
little clouds melted like Cleopatra's pearls. Musing before his fire
the poet sat, not dreaming thoughts no mortal ever dreamed before, but
turning the bacon and apples and stirring in a few herbs, for no
other particular reason than that he had them and thought he might as
well use them.

"Celestina is taking longer than usual," he mused. "Perhaps, though,
Monsieur Tortier intends to surprise me with an unusually fine bottle.
Yes; that is undoubtedly the reason for the delay. He is hunting about
in the cellar for something a little out of the ordinary. But here is
Celestina now!" as the child reappeared, with footsteps so noiseless
the poet saw before he heard her. "Where is the bottle, my little
Ariel? It must be an extra fine vintage. Bless old Tortier's noble
heart!"

"There isn't any bottle," said the child. "Monsieur said that your
account--"

"The miserable old hunks! His heart's no bigger than a pin-head!"

"Please, I'm so sorry!" spoke up Celestina, a suspicious moisture in
her eyes.

"I know it, my dear," returned Straws. "Your heart is as big as his
whole body. One of your tears is more precious than his most priceless
nectar."

"I beg-ged him--that's why I--I stayed so--long!" half-sobbed
Celestina.

"There! there!" said Straws, wiping her eyes. "Of course it's very
tragic, but there's no use crying over spilled milk. Dear me, dear me;
what can we do? It's terrible, but you know the proverb: 'Every cloud
has a silver lining.' Perhaps this one has. I wish it had; or a golden
one! Think of a cloud of gold, Celestina! Wouldn't we be rich? What
would you do with it?"

"I'd go to--Monsieur Tortier's and--and get the bottle," said the
child in an agony of distress.

He lifted her on his knee, soothed her and held her in his arms,
stroking her dark hair.

"I believe you would," he said. "And now, as we haven't got the golden
cloud, let us see how we can get on without it. How shall we conquer
that ogre, Monsieur Tortier? What would you suggest, Celestina?"

The child looked into the fire, with eyes wide-open.

"Come, be a good fairy now," urged Straws, "and tell me."

"Why don't you write him a poem?" said Celestina, turning her eyes,
bright with excitement, upon him.

"A poem! Non--by Jove, you're right! An inspiration, my dear! People
like to be thought what they are not. They want to be praised for
virtues foreign to themselves. The ass wants to masquerade as the
lion. 'Tis the law of nature. Now Monsieur Tortier is a Jew; a scrimp;
a usurer! Very well, we will celebrate the virtues he hath not in
verse and publish the stanza in the Straws' column. After all, we are
only following the example of the historians, and they're an eminently
respectable lot of people. Celestina! You watch the coffee pot, and
I'll grind out the panegyric!"

The child knelt before the fire, but her glance strayed from the
steaming spout to the poet's face, as he sat on the edge of his bed
and rapidly scribbled. By the time the bacon was fairly done and the
other condiments in the frying-pan had turned to a dark hue, the
production was finished and triumphantly waved in mid air by the now
hopeful Straws.

"I'll just read you a part of it, my dear!" he said. "It's not half
bad. But perhaps it would--bore you?" With exaggerated modesty.

"Oh, I just love your poetry!" cried the girl, enthusiastically.

"If everybody were only like you now! Isn't it too bad you've got to
grow up and grow wiser? But here's the refrain. There are six stanzas,
but I won't trouble you with all of them, my dear. One mustn't drive a
willing horse, or a willing auditor."

And in a voice he endeavored to render melodious, with her rapt glance
fixed upon him, Straws read:

        "Sing, my Muse, the lay of the prodigal host!
          Who enters here leaveth behind not hope.
        Course follows course; entrée, relevé, ragoût,
          Ambrosial sauces, pungent, after luscious soup.
        The landlord spurs his guests to fresh attack,
          With fricassee, réchauffé and omelets;
        A toothsome feast that Apicius would fain have served,
          While wine, divine, new zeal in all begets.
            Who is this host, my Muse, pray say?
            Who but that prodigal, Tortier!

"There, my dear," concluded Straws, "those feet are pretty wobbly to
walk, but flattery moves on lame legs faster than truth will travel
on two good ones. Besides, I haven't time to polish them properly, or
the mess in the frying-pan will spoil. Better spoil the poem than the
contents of the flesh pots! Now if--dear me, Celestina, if you haven't
let the coffee pot boil over!"

"Oh, Monsieur," cried the child, almost weeping again. "I forgot to
watch it! I just couldn't while you were writing poetry."

"The excuse more than condones the offense," continued the other. "But
as I was about to say, you take this poem to Monsieur Tortier, make
your prettiest bow and courtesy--let me see you make a courtesy."

The girl bowed as dainty as a little duchess.

"That should melt a heart of stone in itself," commented Straws. "But
Tortier's is flint! After that charming bow, you will give him my
compliments; Mr. Straws' compliments, remember; and, would he be kind
enough just to glance over this poem which Mr. Straws, with much
mental effort, has prepared, and which, if it be acceptable to
Monsieur Tortier, will appear in Mr. Straws' famous and much-talked-of
column in the paper?"

"Oh, Monsieur, I can't remember all that!" said the girl.

"Do it your own way then. Besides, it will be better than mine."

With the poem hugged to her breast, the child fairly flew out of the
room, leaving Straws a prey to conflicting emotions. He experienced
in those moments of suspense all the doubts and fears of the nestling
bard or the tadpole litterateur, awaiting the pleasure and sentence of
the august editor or the puissant publisher. Tortier had been suddenly
exalted to the judge's lofty pedestal. Would he forthwith be an
imperial autocrat; turn tyrant or Thersites; or become critic, one of
"those graminivorous animals which gain subsistence by gorging upon
buds and leaves of the young shrubs of the forest, robbing them of
their verdure and retarding their progress to maturity"?

Straws' anxiety was trouble's labor lost. Celestina appeared, the glad
messenger of success, and now, as she came dancing into the room, bore
in her arms the fruits of victory which she laid before the poet with
sparkling eyes and laughing lips.

"So the poem was accepted?" murmured Straws. "Discerning Tortier!
Excellent dilettante! Let him henceforth be known as a man of taste!"
Here the poet critically examined the bottle. "Nothing vapid, thin or
characterless there!" he added, holding it before the blaze in the
grate. "Positively I'll dedicate my forthcoming book to him. 'To that
worshipful master and patron, the tasteful Tortier!' What did he say,
Celestina, when you tendered him the poem?"

"At first he frowned and then he looked thoughtful. And then he gave
me some orange syrup. And then--O, I don't want to say!" A look of
unutterable concern displacing the happiness on her features.

"Say on, my dear!" cried Straws.

"He--he said he--he didn't think much of it as--O, I can't tell you; I
can't! I can't!"

"Celestina," said the poet sternly, "tell me at once. I command you."

"He said he didn't think much of it as poetry, but that people would
read it and come to his _café_ and--O dear, O dear!"

"Beast! Brute! Parvenu! But there, don't cry, my dear. We have much to
be thankful for--we have the bottle."

"Oh, yes," she said with conviction, and brightening a bit. "We have
the bottle." And as she spoke, "pop" it went, and Celestina laughed.
"May I set your table?" she asked.

"After your inestimable service to me, my dear, I find it impossible
to refuse," he replied gravely.

"How good you are!" she remarked, placing a rather soiled cloth, which
she found somewhere, over a battered trunk.

"I try not to be, but I can't help it!" answered the poet modestly.

"No; that's it; you can't help it!" she returned, moving lightly
around the room, emptying the contents of the frying-pan--now an
aromatic jumble--on to a cracked blue platter, and setting knife and
fork, and a plate, also blue, before him! "And may I wait on you,
too?"

"Well, as a special favor--" He paused, appearing to ponder deeply and
darkly.

Her eyes were bent upon his face with mute appeal, her suspense so
great she stood stock-still in the middle of the floor, frying-pan in
hand.

"Yes; you may wait on me," he said finally, after perplexed and
weighty rumination.

At that her little feet fairly twinkled, but her hand was ever so
careful as she took the coffee pot from the fire and put it near the
blue plate. A glass--how well she knew where everything was!--she
found in some mysterious corner and, sitting down on the floor,
cross-legged like a little Turk, a mere mite almost lost in the
semi-obscurity of the room, she polished it assiduously upon the
corner of the table cloth until it shone free from specks of dust; all
the time humming very lightly like a bird, or a housewife whose heart
is in her work. A strange song, a curious bit of melody that seemed to
spring from some dark past and to presage a future, equally sunless.

"Your supper is ready, Monsieur," she said, rising.

"And I am ready for it. Why, how nicely the table looks! Really, when
we both grow up, I think we should take a silver ship and sail to some
silver shore and live together there forever and evermore. How would
you like it?"

Celestina's lips were mute, but her eyes were full of rapturous
response, and then became suddenly shy, as though afraid of their own
happiness.

"May I pour your wine?" she asked, with downcast lashes.

"Can you manage it and not spill a drop? Remember Cratinus wept and
died of grief seeing his wine--no doubt, this same vintage--spilt!"

But Straws was not called upon to emulate this classic example. The
feat of filling his glass was deftly accomplished, and a moment later
the poet raised it with, "'Drink to me only with thine eyes!'" An
appropriate sentiment for Celestina who had nothing else to drink to
him with. "Won't you have some of this--what shall I call it?--hash,
stew or ration?"

"Oh, I've had my supper," she answered.

"How fortunate for you, my dear! It isn't exactly a company bill of
fare! But everything is what I call snug and cozy. Here we are high up
in the world--right under the roof--all by ourselves, with nobody to
disturb us--"

A heavy footfall without; rap, rap, rap, on the door; no timid,
faltering knock, but a firm application of somebody's knuckles!

"It's that Jack-in-the-box Frenchman," muttered the writer. "Go to the
devil!" he called out.

The door opened.

"You have an original way of receiving visitors!" drawled a languid
voice, and the glance of the surprised poet fell upon Edward Mauville.
"Really, I don't know whether to come in or not," continued the latter
at the threshold.

"I beg your pardon," murmured Straws. "I thought it was a--"

"Creditor?" suggested Mauville, with an amused smile. "I know the
class. Don't apologize! I am intruding. Quite a family party!" he went
on, his gaze resting upon Celestina and the interrupted repast.

With his elegant attire, satin waistcoat and fine ruffles, he seemed
out of place in the attic nook of the Muse; a lordling who had
wandered by mistake into the wrong room. But he bore himself with the
easy assurance of a man who could adapt himself to any surroundings;
even to Calliope's shabby boudoir!

"My dear," remarked the disconcerted bard, "get a chair for Mr.
Mauville. Or--I beg your pardon--would you mind sitting on the bed?
Won't you have some wine? Celestina, bring another glass."

But the girl only stood and stared at the dark, courtly being who thus
unexpectedly had burst in upon them.

"There isn't any more," she finally managed to say. "You've got the
only glass there is, please!"

"Dear me; dear me!" exclaimed Straws. "How glasses do get broken! I
have so few occasions to use them, too, for I don't very often have
visitors."

"You are surprised to see me?" continued Mauville, pleasantly, seating
himself on the edge of the bed. "Go on with your supper. You don't
mind my smoking while you eat?"

"No; the odor of onions is a little strong, isn't it?" laughed the
other. "Rather strange, by the by, some of nature's best restoratives
should be rank and noisome, while her poisons, like the Upas tree, are
often sweet-smelling and agreeable?"

"Yes," commented the land baron; "we make the worst faces over the
medicines that do us the most good."

"I presume," said Straws, delighted at the prospect of an argument,
and forgetting his curiosity over the other's visit in this brief
interchange of words, "nature but calls our attention to the fact that
we may know our truest friends are not those with the sweetest
manners."

"Heaven forbid!" remarked Mauville. "But how are you getting on with
your column? A surfeit of news and gossip, I presume? What a busy
fellow you are, to be sure! Nothing escapes through your seine. Big
fish or little fish, it is all one. You dress them up with alluring
sauce."

The bard shook his head.

"The net has been coming in dry," he said gloomily. "But that's the
way with the fish. Sometimes you catch a good haul, and then they all
disappear. It's been bad luck lately."

"Perhaps I can make a cast for you," cried the patroon eagerly.

"And bring up what?" asked the hack.

"Something everybody will read; that will set the gossips talking."

"A woman's reputation?"

"No; a man's."

"That is to be regretted," said Straws. "If, now, it were only a
woman's--.However, it's the next best thing to start the town
a-gossiping. I am much obliged to you for taking the trouble of
calling. All those stairs to climb, too!"

"I was sure you would be glad to hear of it," remarked the patroon,
slowly, studying with his bright, insolent glance, the pale,
intellectual face of the scribbler.

"Yes; there's only one thing stands in the way."

"And that?"

"I never publish anything I don't believe. Don't misunderstand me,
please." Pouring out a glass of wine. "Unfortunately I am so
incredulous! Isn't it a pity? I am such a carping cynic; a regular
skeptic that follows the old adage, 'Believe that story false that
ought not to be true.' It's such a detriment to my work, too! A pretty
scandal at the top of my column would make me famous, while a
sprinkling of libels and lampoons would enable me to move down a story
or two. But, after all, I'd feel lost in the luxury of a first floor
front chamber. So, you see, nature adjusts herself to our needs."

"Makes the shell to fit the snail, as it were," commented the land
baron, patronizingly, gazing around the little cupboard of a room. "At
any rate," he added, in an effort to hide his dissatisfaction, "it's a
pleasure to become better acquainted with such a--what shall I
say?--whimsical fellow as yourself?"

"That's it," returned the bard. "Whimsical!"

"I dare say you have had many a chance to turn an honest penny or two,
if you had not been so skeptical, as you call it?" remarked the
patroon, significantly. "People, I presume, have even offered to pay
you for publishing the compliments of the season about their
neighbors?"

"Well," answered the scribbler, laughing, "I may have Midas' longing
for gold, but I also have his ears. And the ears predominate. I am
such an ass I have even returned a fair petitioner's perfumed note!
Such a dainty little hand! How good the paper smelt! How devilish it
read! The world's idea about the devil always smelling of sulphur and
brimstone is a slander on that much abused person. I can positively
affirm that he smells of musk, attar, myrrh; as though he had lain
somewhere with a lady's sachet or scent-bag."

"Really you should revise Milton," murmured the land baron,
carelessly, his interest quite gone. "But I must be moving on." And he
arose. "Good evening."

"Good night!" said Straws, going to the door after his departing
guest. "Can you see your way down? Look out for the turn! And don't
depend too much on the bannisters--they're rather shaky. Well, he's
gone!" Returning once more to the room. "We're coming up in the world,
my dear, when such fashionable callers visit us! What do you think of
him?"

"He is very--handsome!" replied the child.

"Oh, the vanity of the sex! Is he--is he handsomer than I?"

"Are you--handsome?" she asked.

"Eh? Don't you think so?"

"No-o," she cried, in a passion of distressed truthfulness.

"Thank you, my dear! What a flattering creature you'll become, if you
keep on as you've begun! How you'll wheedle the men, to be sure!"

"But mustn't I say what I think?"

"Always! I'm a bad adviser! Think of bringing up a young person,
especially a girl, to speak the truth! What a time she'll have!"

"But I couldn't do anything else!" she continued, with absorbing and
painful anxiety.

"Don't, then! I'm instructing you to your destruction, but--don't! I'm
a philosopher in the School for Making Simpletons. What will you do
when you go out into the broad world with truth for your banner and
your heart on your sleeve?"

"How could I have my heart on my sleeve?" asked Celestina.

"Because you couldn't help it!"

"Really and truly on my sleeve?"

"Really and truly!" he affirmed, gravely.

"How funny!" answered the girl.

"No; tragic! But what shall we do now, Celestina?"

"Wash the dishes," said the child, practically.

"But, my dear, we won't need them until to-morrow," expostulated the
poet. "Precipitancy is a bad fault. Now, if you had proposed a little
music, or a fairy tale--"

"Oh, I could wash them while you played, or told me a story,"
suggested the child, eagerly.

"That isn't such a bad idea," commented Straws, reflectively.

"Then you will let me?" she asked.

"Go ahead!" said the bard, and he reached for the whistle.

CHAPTER VIII

THE SWEETEST THING IN NATURE

The city, bustling and animated by day, like an energetic housewife,
was at night a gay demoiselle, awakening to new life and excitement.
The clerk betook himself to his bowling or billiards and the mechanic
to the circus, while beauty and fashion repaired to the concert room
or to the Opéra Français, to listen to Halévy or Donizetti. Restless
Americans or Irishmen rubbed elbows with the hurrying Frenchman or
Spaniard, and the dignified creole gentleman of leisure alone was
wrapped in a plenitude of dignity, computing probably the interest he
drew on money loaned these assiduous foreigners.

Soldiers who had been granted leave of absence or had slipped the
guard at the camp on Andrew Jackson's battle-ground swaggered through
the streets. The change from a diet of pork and beans and army hard
tack was so marked that Uncle Sam's young men threw restraint to the
winds, took the mask balls by storm and gallantly assailed and made
willing prisoners of the fair sex. Eager to exchange their irksome
life in camp for the active campaign in Mexico, it was small wonder
they relieved their impatience by many a valiant dash into the
hospitable town.

Carriages drove by with a rumble and a clatter, revealing a fleeting
glimpse of some beauty with full, dark eye. Venders of flowers
importuned the passers-by, doing a brisk business; the oyster and
coffee stands reminded the spectator of a thoroughfare in London on a
Saturday night, with the people congregating about the street stalls;
but the brilliantly illumined places of amusement, with their careless
patrons plainly apparent to all from without, resembled rather a
boulevard scene in the metropolis of France. "Probably," says a
skeptical chronicler, "here and there are quiet drawing-rooms, and
tranquil firesides, where domestic love is a chaste, presiding
goddess." But the writer merely presumes such might have been the
case, and it is evident from his manner of expression, he offers the
suggestion, or afterthought, charitably, with some doubts in his mind.
Certainly he never personally encountered the chaste goddess of the
hearth, or he would have qualified his words and made his statement
more positive.

From the life of the streets, the land baron turned into a well-lighted
entrance, passing into a large, luxuriously furnished saloon, at one
end of which stood a table somewhat resembling a roulette board.
Seated on one side was the phlegmatic cashier, and, opposite him, the
dealer, equally impassive. Unlike faro--the popular New Orleans
game--no deal box was needed, the dealer holding the cards in his
hand, while a cavity in the center of the table contained a basket,
where the cards, once used, were thrown. A large chandelier cast a
brilliant light upon the scene.

"_Messieurs, faites vos jeux_," drawled the monotonous voice of the
dealer, and expectation was keenly written on the faces of the double
circle of players--variously disclosed, but, nevertheless, apparent in
all; a transformation of the natural expression of the features; an
obvious nervousness of manner, or where the countenance was impassive,
controlled by a strong will, a peculiar glitter of the eyes,
betokening the most insatiable species of the gambler. As the dealer
began to shuffle together six packs of cards and place them in a row
on the table, he called out:

"Nothing more goes, gentlemen!"

The rapidity with which the cashier counted the winnings at a distance
and shoved them here and there with the long rake was amazing and
bewildering to the novice risking a few gold pieces for the first time
on the altar of chance. Sorting the gold pieces in even bunches, the
cashier estimated them in a moment; shoved them together; counted an
equal amount of fives with his fingers; made a little twirl in the
pile on the table; pushed it toward the winning pieces and left them
tumbled up together in pleasing confusion.

"_Messieurs, faites vos_--"

And the clinking went on, growing louder and louder, the clinking of
gold, which has a particularly musical sound, penetrating,
crystalline as the golden bells of Exodus, tinkling in the twilight of
the temple on the priest's raiment. The clinking, clinking, that
lingers in the brain long after, drawing the players to it night after
night; an intoxicating murmur, singing the desires that dominate the
world; the jingling that makes all men kin!

"Oh, dear!" said a light feminine voice, as the rapacious rake
unceremoniously drew in a poor, diminutive pile of gold. "Why did I
play? Isn't it provoking?"

"You have my sympathy, Mistress Susan," breathed a voice near her.

Looking around, she had the grace to blush becomingly, and approached
Mauville with an expressive gesture, leaving Adonis and Kate at the
table.

"Don't be shocked, Mr. Mauville," she began, hurriedly. "We were told
it was among the sights, and, having natural curiosity--"

"I understand. Armed with righteousness, why should not one go
anywhere?"

"Why, indeed?" she murmured.

"But I'm afraid I'm taking you from your play?"

"I'm not going to play any more to-night."

"Tired, already?"

"No; but--but I haven't a cent. That miserable table has robbed me of
everything. All I have left"--piteously--"are the clothes on my
back."

"Something must have been the matter with your 'system.' But if a
temporary loan--"

Susan was tempted, gazing longingly at the table, with the fever
burning in her.

"No," she said, finally. "I _think_ I would win, but, of course, I
_might_ lose."

"A wise reservation! Never place your fortune on the hazard of the
die."

"But I have! What's the use of making good resolutions now? It's like
closing the barn-door after--"

"Just so!" he agreed. "But it might have been worse."

"How?" In dismay. "Didn't that stony-looking man rake in my last gold
piece? He didn't even look sorry, either. But what is the matter with
your arm?" The land baron's expression became ominous. "You shook
hands with your left hand. Oh, I see; the duel!" Lightly.

"How did you hear about it?" asked Mauville, irritably.

"Oh, in a roundabout way. Murder will out! And Constance--she was so
solicitous about Mr. Saint-Prosper, but rather proud, I believe,
because he"--with a laugh--"came off victorious."

Susan's prattle, although accompanied by innocent glances from her
blue eyes, was sometimes the most irritating thing in the world, and
the land baron, goaded beyond endurance, now threw off his careless
manner and swore in an undertone by "every devil in Satan's
calendar."

"Can you not reserve your soliloquy until you leave me?" observed
Susan, sweetly. "Otherwise--"

"I regret to have shocked your ladyship," he murmured, satirically.

"I forgive you." Raising her guileless eyes. "When I think of the
provocation, I do not blame you--so much!"

"That is more than people do in your case," muttered the land baron
savagely.

Susan's hand trembled. "What do you mean?" she asked, not without
apprehension regarding his answer.

"Oh, that affair with the young officer--the lad who was killed in the
duel, you know--"

Her composure forsook her for the moment and she bit her lip cruelly.

"Don't!" she whispered. "I am not to blame. I never dreamed it would
go so far! Why should people--"

"Why?" he interposed, ironically.

Susan pulled herself together. "Yes, why?" she repeated, defiantly.
"Can women prevent men from making fools of themselves any more than
they can prevent them from amusing themselves as they will? To-day it
is this toy; to-morrow, another. At length"--bitterly--"a woman comes
to consider herself only a toy."

Her companion regarded her curiously. "Well, well!" he ejaculated,
finally. "Losing at cards doesn't agree with your temper."

"Nor being worsted by Saint-Prosper with yours!" she retorted
quickly.

Mauville looked virulent, but Susan, feeling that she had retaliated
in ample measure, recovered her usual equanimity of temper and placed
a conciliatory hand sympathetically on his arm.

"We have both had a good deal to try us, haven't we? But how stupid
men are!" she added suddenly. "As if you could not find other
consolation!"

He directed toward her an inquiring glance.

"Some time ago, while I was acting in London," resumed Susan,
thoughtfully, "the leading lady refused to receive the attentions of a
certain odious English lord. She was to make her appearance in a piece
upon which her reputation was staked. Mark what happened! She was
hissed! Hissed from the stage! My lord led this hostile demonstration
and all his hired claqueurs joined in. She was ruined; ruined!"
concluded Susan, smiling amiably.

"You are ingenious, Mistress Susan--not to say a trifle diabolical.
Your plan--"

She opened her eyes widely. "I have suggested no plan," she
interrupted, hurriedly.

"Well, let us sit down and I will tell you about a French officer
who--But here is a quiet corner, Mistress Susan, and if you will
promise not to repeat it, I will regale you with a bit of interesting
gossip."

"I promise--they always do!" she laughed.

For such a frivolous lady, Susan was an excellent listener. She, who
on occasions chattered like a magpie, was now silent as a mouse,
drinking in the other's words with parted lips and sparkling eyes.
First he showed her the letter François had brought him. Unmarked by
postal indications, the missive had evidently been intrusted to a
private messenger of the governor whose seal it bore. Dated about
three years previously, it was written in a somewhat illegible, but
not unintelligible, scrawl, the duke's own handwriting.

"I send you, my dear marquis," began the duke, "a copy of the secret
report of the military tribunal appointed to investigate the charges
against your kinsman, Lieut. Saint-Prosper, and regret the finding of
the court should have been one of guilty of treason.

"Saint-Prosper and Abd-el-Kader met near the tomb of a marabout. From
him the French officer received a famous ruby which he thrust beneath
his zaboot--the first fee of their compact. That night when the town
lay sleeping, a turbaned host, armed with yataghans, stole through the
flowering cactuses. Sesame! The gate opened to them; they swarmed
within! The soldiers, surprised, could render little resistance; the
ruthless invaders cut them down while they were sleeping or before
they could sound the alarm. The bravest blood of France flowed
lavishly in the face of the treacherous onslaught; blood of men who
had been his fastest friends, among whom he had been so popular for
his dauntless courage and devil-may-care temerity! But a period,
fearfully brief, and the beloved tri-color was trampled in the dust;
the barbarian flag of the Emir floated in its place.

"All these particulars, and the part Saint-Prosper played in the
terrible drama, Abd-el-Kader, who is now our prisoner, has himself
confessed. The necessity for secrecy, you, my dear Marquis, will
appreciate. The publicity of the affair now would work incalculable
injury to the nation. It is imperative to preserve the army from the
taint of scandal. The nation hangs on a thread. God knows there is
iniquity abroad. I, who have labored for the honor of France and
planted her flag in distant lands, look for defeat, not through want
of bravery, but from internal causes. A matter like this might lead to
a popular uprising against the army. Therefore, the king wills it
shall be buried by his faithful servants."

As Mauville proceeded Susan remained motionless, her eyes growing
larger and larger, until they shone like two lovely sapphires, but
when he concluded she gave a little sigh of pleasure and leaned back
with a pleased smile.

"Well?" he said, finally, after waiting some moments for her to
speak.

"How piquantly wicked he is!" she exclaimed, softly.

"Piquantly, indeed!" repeated the land baron, dryly.

"And he carries it without a twinge! What a petrified conscience!"

"I believe you find him more interesting than ever?" said Mauville,
impatiently.

"Possibly!" Languidly. "An exceptional moral ailment sometimes makes a
man more attractive--like a--an interesting subject in a hospital, you
know! But I have always felt," she continued, with sudden seriousness,
"there was something wrong with him. When I first saw him, I was sure
he had had no ordinary past, but I did not dream it was quite so--what
shall we call it--"

"Unsavory?" suggested her companion.

"That accounts for his unwillingness to talk about Africa," went on
Susan. "Soldiers, as a rule, you know, like to tell all about their
sanguinary exploits. But the tented field was a forbidden topic with
him. And once when I asked him about Algiers he was almost rudely
evasive."

"He probably lives in constant fear his secret will become known,"
said Mauville, thoughtfully. "As a matter of fact, the law provides
that no person is to be indicted for treason unless within three years
after the offense. The tribunal did not return an indictment; the
three years have just expired. Did he come to America to make sure of
these three years?"

But Susan's thoughts had flitted to another feature of the story.

"How strange my marquis should be connected with the case! What an old
compliment-monger he was! He vowed he was deeply smitten with me."

"And then went home and took to his bed!" added Mauville, grimly.

"You wretch!" said the young woman, playfully. "So that is the reason
the dear old molly-coddle did not take me to any of the gay suppers he
promised? Is it not strange Saint-Prosper has not met him?"

"You forget the marquis has been confined to his room since his brief,
but disastrous, courtship of you. His infatuation seems to have
brought him to the verge of dissolution."

"Was it not worth the price?" she retorted, rising. "But I see my
sister and Adonis are going, so I must be off, too. So glad to have
met you!"

"You are no longer angry with me?"

"No; you are very nice," she said. "And you have forgiven me?"

"Need you ask?" Pressing her hand. "Good evening, Mistress Susan!"

"Good evening. Oh, by the way, I have an appointment with Constance to
rehearse a little scene together this evening. Would you mind loaning
me that letter?"

"With pleasure; but remember your promise."

"Promise?" repeated the young woman.

"Not to tell."

"Oh, of course," said Susan.

"But if you shouldn't--"

"Then?"

"Then you might say the marquis, your friend and admirer, gave you
the letter. It would, perhaps, be easier for you to account for it
than for me."

"But if the marquis should learn--" began the other, half-dubiously.

"He is too ill for anything except the grave."

"Oh, the poor old dear!"

She looked at the gaming table with its indefatigable players and then
turned to Kate and Adonis who approached at that moment. "How did you
come out, Adonis?"

"Out," he said, curtly.

"Lucky in love, unlucky at"--began Kate.

"Then you must be very unlucky in love," he retorted, "for you were a
good winner at cards."

"Oh, there are exceptions to that rule," said Kate lazily, with a
yawn. "I'm lucky at both--in New Orleans!"

"I have perceived it," retorted Adonis, bitterly.

"Don't quarrel," Susan implored. Regarding the table once more, she
sighed: "I'm so sorry I came!"

But her feet fairly danced as she flew towards the St. Charles. She
entered, airy as a saucy craft, with "all sails in full chase, ribbons
and gauzes streaming at the top," and, with a frou-frou of skirts,
burst into Constance's room, brimful of news and importance. She
remained there for some time, and when she left, it was noteworthy her
spirits were still high. In crossing the hall, her red stockings
became a fitting color accompaniment to her sprightly step, as she
moved over the heavy carpet, skirts raised coquettishly, humming with
the gaiety of a young girl who has just left boarding school.

"A blooming, innocent creature!" growled an up-the-river planter,
surveying her from one of the landings. "Lord love me, if she were
only a quadroon, I'd buy her!"

CHAPTER IX

A DEBUT IN THE CRESCENT CITY

A versatile dramatic poet is grim Destiny, making with equal facility
tragedy, farce, burletta, masque or mystery. The world is his inn,
and, like the wandering master of interludes, he sets up his stage in
the court-yard, beneath the windows of mortals, takes out his figures
and evolves charming comedies, stirring melodramas, spirited
harlequinades and moving divertissement. But it is in tragedy his
constructive ability is especially apparent, and his characters,
tripping along unsuspectingly in the sunny byways, are suddenly
confronted by the terrifying mask and realize life is not all pleasant
pastime and that the Greek philosophy of retribution is nature's law,
preserving the unities. When the time comes, the Master of events,
adjusting them in prescribed lines, reaches by stern obligation the
avoidless conclusion.

Consulting no law but his own will, the Marquis de Ligne had lived as
though he were the autocrat of fate itself instead of one of its
servants, and therefore was surprised when the venerable playwright
prepared the unexpected dénouement. In pursuance of this end, it was
decreed by the imperious and incontrovertible dramatist of the human
family that this crabbed, vicious, antiquated marionette should wend
his way to the St. Charles on a particular evening. Since the day at
the races, the eccentric nobleman had been ill and confined to his
room, but now he was beginning to hobble around, and, immediately with
returning strength, sought diversion.

"François," he said, "what is there at the theater to-night?"

"Comic opera, my lord?"

The marquis made a grimace. "Comic opera outside of Paris!" he
exclaimed, with a shrug of the shoulders.

"A new actress makes her début at the St. Charles."

"Let it be the début, then! Perhaps she will fail, and that will amuse
me."

"Yes, my lord."

"And, by the way, François, did you see anything of a large envelope,
a buff-colored envelope, I thought I left in my secretary?"

"No, my lord." But François became just a shade paler.

"It is strange," said the marquis, half to himself, "what could have
become of it! I destroyed other papers, but not that. You are sure,
François, you did not steal it?"

By this time the servant's knees began to tremble, and, had the
marquis' eyesight been better, he could not have failed to detect the
other's agitation. But the valet assumed a bold front, as he asked:

"Why should I have stolen it?"

"True, why?" grumbled the marquis. "It would be of no service to you.
No; you didn't take it. I believe you honest--in this case!"

"Thank you, my lord!"

"After all, what does it matter?" muttered the nobleman to himself.
"What's in a good name to-day--with traitors within and traitors
without? 'Tis love's labor lost to have protected it! We've fostered a
military nest of traitors. The scorpions will be faithful to nothing
but their own ends. They'll fight for any master."

Recalled to his purpose of attending the play by François' bringing
from the wardrobe sundry articles of attire, the marquis underwent an
elaborate toilet, recovering his good humor as this complicated
operation proceeded. Indeed, by the time it had reached a triumphant
end and the valet set the marquis before a mirror, the latter had
forgotten his dissatisfaction at the government in his pleasure with
himself.

"Too much excitement is dangerous, is it?" he mumbled. "I am afraid
there will be none at all. A stage-struck young woman; a doll-like
face, probably; a milk-and-water performance! Now, in the old days
actors were artists. Yes, artists!" he repeated, as though he had
struck a chord that vibrated in his memory.

Arriving at the theater, he was surprised at the scene of animation;
the line of carriages; the crowd about the doors and in the entrance
hall! Evidently the city eagerly sought novelty, and Barnes' company,
offering new diversion after many weeks of opera, drew a fair
proportion of pleasure-seekers to the portals of the drama. The noise
of rattling wheels and the banging of carriage doors; the aspect of
many fair ladies, irreproachably gowned; the confusion of voices from
venders hovering near the gallery entrance--imparted a cosmopolitan
atmosphere to the surroundings.

"You'd think some well-known player was going to appear, François!"
grumbled the marquis, as he thrust his head out of his carriage.
"Looks like a theater off the Strand! And there's an orange-girl! A
dusky Peggy!"

The vehicle of the nobleman drew up before the brilliantly-lighted
entrance. Mincingly, the marquis dismounted, assisted by the valet;
within he was met by a _loge_ director who, with the airs of a
Chesterfield, bowed the people in and out.

"Your ticket, sir!" said this courteous individual, scraping unusually
low.

The marquis waved his hand toward his man, and François produced the
bits of pasteboard. Escorted to his box, the nobleman settled himself
in an easy chair, after which he stared impudently and inquisitively
around him.

And what a heterogeneous assemblage it was; of how many nationalities
made up; gay bachelors, representatives of the western trade and
eastern manufacturers; a fair sprinkling of the military element,
seeking amusement before departing for the front, their brass buttons
and striking new uniforms a grim reminder of the conflict waging
between the United States and Mexico; cotton brokers, banking agents,
sugar, tobacco and flour dealers; some evidently English with their
rosy complexions, and others French by their gesticulations! And among
the women, dashing belles from Saratoga, proud beauties from
Louisville, "milliner-martyred" daughters of interior planters, and
handsome creole matrons, in black gowns that set off their white
shoulders!

In this stately assemblage--to particularize for a moment!--was seated
the (erstwhile!) saintly Madame Etalage, still proud in her bearing,
although white as an angel, and by her side, her carpet knight, an
extravagant, preposterous fop. A few seats in front of her prattled
the lovely _ingenue_, little Fantoccini, a biting libeller of other
actresses, with her pitiless tongue. To her left was a shaggy-looking
gentleman, the Addison of New Orleans' letters, a most tolerant
critic, who never spoke to a woman if he could avoid doing so, but
who, from his philosophical stool, viewed the sex with a conviction it
could do no wrong; a judgment in perspective, as it were!

The marquis paid little attention to the men; it was the feminine
portion of the audience that interested him, and he regarded it with a
gloating leer, the expression of a senile satyr. Albeit a little on
the seamy side of life, his rank and wealth were such that he himself
attracted a good deal of attention, matronly eyes being turned in his
direction with not unkindly purport. The marquis perceived the stir
his presence occasioned and was not at all displeased; on the
contrary, his manner denoted gratification, smiling and smirking from
bud to blossom and from blossom to bud!

How fascinating it was to revel in the sight of so much youth and
beauty from the brink of the grave whereon he stood; how young it made
him feel again! He rubbed his withered hands together in childish
delight, while he contemplated the lively charms of Fantoccini or
devoted himself to the no less diverting scrutiny of certain other
dark-haired ladies.

While occupied in this agreeable pastime the nobleman became dimly
conscious the debutante had appeared and was greeted with the moderate
applause of an audience that is reserving its opinion. "Gad," said one
of the dandies who was keenly observing the nobleman, "it's
fashionable to look at the people and not at the actors!" And he
straightway stared at the boxes, assuming a lackadaisical, languishing
air. Having taken note of his surroundings to his satisfaction, the
marquis at length condescended to turn his eye-glass deliberately and
quizzically to the stage. His sight was not the best, and he gazed for
some time before discerning a graceful figure and a pure, oval face,
with dark hair and eyes.

"Humph, not a bad stage presence!" he thought. "Probably plenty of
beauty, with a paucity of talent! That's the way nowadays. The
voice--why, where have I heard it before? A beautiful voice! What
melody, what power, what richness! And the face--" Here he wiped the
moisture from his glasses--"if the face is equal to the voice, she has
an unusual combination in an artist."

Again he elevated the glass. Suddenly his attenuated frame straightened,
his hand shook violently and, the glasses fell from his nerveless
fingers.

"Impossible!" he murmured. But the melody of those tones continued to
fall upon his ears like a voice from the past.

When the curtain went down on the first act there was a storm of
applause. In New Orleans nothing was done by halves, and Constance,
as Adrienne Lecouvreur, radiant in youth and the knowledge of
success, was called out several times. The creoles made a vigorous
demonstration; the Americans were as pleased in their less impulsive
way; and in the loges all the lattices were pushed up, "a compliment
to any player," said Straws. To the marquis, the ladies in the
_loges_ were only reminiscent of the fashionable dames, with bare
shoulders and glittering jewels, in the side boxes of old Drury
Lane, leaning from their high tribunals to applaud the Adrienne of
twenty years ago!

He did not sit in a theater in New Orleans now, but in London town,
with a woman by his side who bent beneath the storm of words she knew
were directed at her. As in a dream he lingered, plunged in thought,
with no longer the cynical, carping expression on his face as he
looked at the stage, but awed and wonder-stricken, transported to
another scene through the lapse of years that folded their shadowy
wings and made the past to-day. Two vivid pictures floated before him
as though they belonged to the present: Adrienne, bright, smiling and
happy, as she rushed into the green room, with the plaudits of the
multitude heard outside; Adrienne, in her last moments, betrayed to
death!

They were applauding now, or was it but the mocking echo of the past?
The curtain had descended, but went up again, and the actress stood
with flowers showered around her. Save that she was in the springtime
of life, while the other had entered summer's season; that her art was
tender and romantic, rather than overwhelming and tragic, she was the
counterpart of the actress he had deserted in London; a faithful
prototype, bearing the mother's eyes, brow and features; a moving,
living picture of the dead, as though the grave had rolled back its
stone and she had stepped forth, young once more, trusting and
innocent.

The musical bell rang in the wine room, where the worshipers of
Bacchus were assembled, the signal that the drop would rise again in
five minutes. At the bar the imbibers were passing judgment.

"What elegance, deah boy! But cold--give me Fantoccini!" cried the
carpet knight.

"Fantoccini's a doll to her!" retorted the worldly young spark
addressed.

"A wicked French doll, then! What do you think?" Turning to the local
Addison.

"Sir, she 'snatches a grace beyond the reach of art'!" replied that
worthy.

"You ask for a criticism, and he answers in poetry!" retorted the
first speaker.

"'Tis only the expression of the audience!" interposed another voice.

"Oh, of course, Mr. Mauville, if you, too, take her part, that is the
end of it!"

The land baron's smile revealed withering contempt, as with eyes
bright with suppressed excitement, and his face unusually sallow, he
joined the group.

"The end of it!" he repeated, fixing his glance upon the captious
dandy. "The beginning, you mean! The beginning of her triumphs!"

"Oh, have your own way!" answered the disconcerted critic.

Mauville deliberately turned his back. "And such dunces sit in
judgment!" he muttered to the scholar.

"Curse me, Mauville's in a temper to-night!" said the spark in a low
voice. "Been drinking, I reckon! But it's time for the next act!"

Punches and juleps were hastily disposed of, and the imbibers quickly
sought their places. This sudden influx, with its accompanying
laughter and chattering, aroused the marquis from his lethargy. He
started and looked around him in bewilderment. The noise and the light
conversation, however, soon recalled his mind to a sense of his
surroundings, and he endeavored to recover his self-possession.

Could it be possible it was but a likeness his imagination had
converted into such vivid resemblance? A sudden thought seized him and
he looked around toward the door of the box.

"François!" he called, and the valet, who had been waiting his
master's pleasure without, immediately appeared.

"Sit down, François!" commanded the marquis. "I am not feeling well. I
may conclude to leave soon, and may need your arm."

The servant obeyed, and the nobleman, under pretense of finding more
air near the door, drew back his chair, where he could furtively watch
his man's face. The orchestra ceased; the curtain rose, and the valet
gazed mechanically at the stage. In his way, François was as _blasé_
as his master, only, of course, he understood his position too well to
reveal that lassitude and ennui, the expression of which was the
particular privilege of his betters. He had seen many great actresses
and heard many peerless singers; he had delved after his fashion into
sundry problems, and had earned as great a right as any of the
nobility to satiety and defatigation in his old age, but unfortunately
he was born in a class which may feel but not reveal, and mask alike
content and discontent.

Again those tones floated out from the past; musical, soft! The
marquis trembled. Did not the man notice? No; he was still looking
gravely before him. Dolt; did he not remember? Could he not recall the
times beyond number when he had heard that voice; in the ivy-covered
cottage; in the garden of English roses?

Suddenly the valet uttered an exclamation; the stolid aspect of his
face gave way to an obvious thrill of interest.

"My lord!" he cried.

"An excellent actress, François; an excellent actress!" said the
marquis, rising. "Is that my coat? Get it for me. What are you
standing there for? Your arm! Don't you see I am waiting?"

Overwrought and excitable, he did not dare remain for the latter
portion of the drama; better leave before the last act, he told
himself, and, dazed by the reappearance of that vision, the old man
fairly staggered from the box.

The curtain fell for the last time, and Barnes, with exultation, stood
watching in the wings. She had triumphed, his little girl; she had won
the great, generous heart of New Orleans. He clapped his hands
furiously, joining in the evidences of approval, and, when the ovation
finally ceased and she approached, the old manager was so overcome he
had not a word to say. She looked at him questioningly, and he who had
always been her instructor folded her fondly to his breast.

"I owe it all to you," she whispered.

"Pooh!" he answered. "You stole fire from heaven. I am but a
theatrical, bombastic, barnstorming Thespian."

"Would you spoil me?" she interrupted, tenderly.

"You are your mother over again, my dear! If she were only here now!
But where is Saint-Prosper? He has not yet congratulated you? He, our
good genius, whose generosity has made all this possible!" And Barnes
half-turned, when she placed a detaining hand on his arm.

"No, no!"

"Why, my dear, have you and he--"

"Is it not enough that you are pleased?" replied Constance, hastily,
with a glance so shining he forgot all further remonstrances.

"Pleased!" exclaimed Barnes. "Why, I feel as gay as Momus! But we'll
sing Te Deum later at the festive board. Go now and get ready!"

CHAPTER X

LAUGHTER AND TEARS

A supper was given the company after the performance by the manager,
to which representatives of the press--artful Barnes!--had been
invited. Of all the merry evenings in the bohemian world, that was one
of the merriest. Next to the young girl sat the Count de Propriac, his
breast covered with a double row of medals. Of the toasts drunk to
Constance, the manager, poets Straws and Phazma, etc., unfortunately
no record remains. Of the recollections of the wiry old lady; the
impromptu verse of the rhymsters; the roaring speech of Mr. Barnes;
the song and dainty flower dance by Susan and Kate--only the bare
facts have descended to the chronicler.

So fancy must picture the wreaths of smoke; the superabundance of
flowers, the fragrance of cigars mingling with the perfume of fading
floral beauties; the pale dark-eyed girl presiding, upon her dusky
hair a crown of laurel, set there, despite her protestations, by
Phazma and Straws; the devotion of the count to his fair neighbor; the
almost superhuman pride of noisy Barnes; the attention bestowed by
Susan upon Saint-Prosper, while through his mind wandered the words of
a French song:

                  "Adieu, la cour, adieu les dames;
                  Adieu les filles et les femmes--"

Intermixed with this sad refrain the soldier's thoughts reverted to
the performance, and amidst the chatter of Susan, he reviewed again
and again the details of that evening. Was this the young girl who
played in school-houses, inns or town halls, he had asked himself,
seated in the rear of the theater? How coldly critical had been her
auditors; some of the faces about him ironical; the bored, tired faces
of men who had well-nigh drained life's novelties; the artificially
vivacious faces of women who played at light-heartedness and gaiety!
Yet how free from concern had she been, as natural and composed as
though her future had not depended upon that night! When she won an
ovation, he had himself forgotten to applaud, but had sat there,
looking from her to the auditors, to whom she was now bound by ties of
admiration and friendliness.

"Don't you like her?" a voice next to him had asked.

Like her? He had looked at the man, blankly.

"Yes," he had replied.

Then the past had seemed to roll between them: the burning sands; the
voices of the troops; the bugle call! In his brain wild thoughts had
surged and flowed--as they were surging and flowing now.

"Is he not handsome, Constance's new admirer?" whispered Susan. "What
can he be saying? She looks so pleased! He is very rich, isn't he?"

"I don't know," answered Saint-Prosper, brusquely.

Again the thoughts surged and surged, and the past intruded itself!
Reaching for his glass, he drank quickly.

"Don't you ever feel the effects of wine?" asked the young woman.

His glance chilled her, it seemed so strange and steely!

"I believe you are so--so strong you don't even notice it," added
Susan, with conviction. "But you don't have half as good a time!"

"Perhaps I enjoy myself in my way," he answered.

"What is your way?" she asked quickly. "You don't appear to be wildly
hilarious in your pleasures." And Susan's bright eyes rested on him
curiously. "But we were speaking about the count and Constance. Don't
you think it would be a good match?" she continued with enthusiasm.
"Alas, my titled admirer got no further than the beginning. But men
are deceivers ever! When they _do_ reach the Songs of Solomon, they
pass on to Exodus!"

"And leave the fair ones to Lamentations," said Straws, who had caught
her last remarks.

"Or Revelations!" added Phazma.

At the sound of their laughter, Constance looked coldly their way,
until a remark from the count at her right, and, "As I was saying, my
dear," from the old lady at her left, engrossed the young girl's
attention once more. But finally the great enemy of joy--the grim
guardian of human pleasure--the reaper whose iron hands move ever in a
circle, symbolical of eternity--finally, Time reminded Barnes that the
hour had surely arrived when the curtain should descend upon these
festivities. So he roared out a last blithe farewell, and the guests
departed one by one, taking with them flowers in memory of the
occasion, until all had left save Constance, the count, Saint-Prosper
and the manager. Barnes was talking somewhat incoherently, holding the
soldier by the coat and plunging into successive anecdotes about stage
folk, while Saint-Prosper, apparently listening, observed the diplomat
and Constance, whose conversation he could overhear.

"As I said to the Royal Infanta of Spain, flattery flies before truth
in your presence, Mademoiselle," sighed the count. And then raising
her hand to his lips, "_Ah, ma chere Mademoiselle, que je vous
adore!_" he whispered.

She withdrew it hastily, and, ogling and gesticulating, he bowed
himself out, followed by the manager.

Leaning against the chair, her figure outlined by the glow from the
crystal chandelier, her face in shadow, the hand the diplomat had
pressed to his lips resting in the exposed light on the mahogany, the
gaiety went out of her face, and the young girl wearily brushed the
hair from her brow. As if unaware of the soldier's presence, she
glanced absently at the table in its wrecked glory, and, throwing her
lace wrap over her arm, was moving toward the door, when he spoke.

"Miss Carew!"

She paused, standing with clasped hands before him, while the scarf
slipped from her arm and fell at her feet.

"May I not also tell you how glad I am--that you succeeded to-night?"

"I dislike congratulations!" she said, indifferently.

He looked at her quickly, but her eyes expressed only apathy. In his a
sudden gleam of light appeared.

"From me, you mean?" The light became brighter.

She did not answer. His self-control was fast ebbing.

"You underestimate your favors, if you fancy they are easily
forgotten!"

A crimson flush extended to her brow; the unconcern died out of her
eyes.

"I do not understand," she answered, slowly.

"When a woman says 'I do not understand,' she means 'I wish to
forget'."

Her wide-open glance flashed ominously to his; she clasped and
unclasped her fingers.

"Forget what?" she said, coldly.

"Nameless nothings!" he returned. "A smile--a glance--nothing to you,
perhaps, but"--the set expression of his face giving way to abrupt
passion!--"everything to me! Perhaps I had not meant to say this, but
it seems as though the words must come out to-night. It may be"--his
voice vibrating with strange earnestness--"for once I want to be
myself. For weeks we have been--friends--and then suddenly you begin
to treat me--how? As though I no longer existed! Why did you deceive
me--let me drift on? Because I was mute, did you think I was blind?
Why did I join the strollers--the land baron accused me of following
you across the country. He was right; I was following you. I would not
confess it to myself before. But I confess it now! It was a fool's
paradise," he ended, bitterly.

She shrank back before his vehement words; something within her
appeared violated; as though his plea had penetrated the sanctity of
her reserve.

"Would it not be well to say nothing about deception?" she replied,
and her dark eyes swept his face. Then, turning from him abruptly, she
stepped to the window, and, drawing aside the lace curtains
mechanically, looked out.

The city below was yet teeming with life, lights gleaming everywhere
and shadowy figures passing. Suddenly out of the darkness came a
company of soldiers who had just landed, marching through the streets
toward the camping ground and singing as they went.

The chorus, like a mighty breath of patriotism, filled her heart to
overflowing. It seemed as though she had heard it for the first time;
had never before felt its potency. All the tragedy of war swept before
her; all that inspiring, strange affection for country, kith and kin,
suddenly exalted her.

Above the tramping of feet, the melody rose and fell on the distant
air, dying away as the figures vanished in the gloom. With its love of
native land, its expression of the unity of comradeship and ties
stronger than death, the song appeared to challenge an answer; and,
when the music ceased, and only the drum-beats still seemed to make
themselves heard, she raised her head without moving from her position
and looked at him to see if he understood. But though she glanced at
him, she hardly saw him. In her mind was another picture--the betrayed
garrison; the soldiers slain!--and the horror of it threw such a film
over her gaze that he became as a figure in some distressing dream.

An inkling of her meaning--the mute questioning of her eyes--the dread
evoked by that revolting vision of the past--were reflected in his
glance.

"Deceived you?" he began, and his voice, to her, sounded as from afar.
"How--what--"

"Must it be--could it be put into words?"

The deepest shadows dwelt in her eyes; shadows he could not penetrate,
although he still doggedly, yet apprehensively, regarded her! Watching
her, his brow grew darker.

"Why not?" he continued, stubbornly.

Why? The dimness that had obscured her vision lifted. Now she saw him
very plainly, indeed; tall and powerful; his face, harsh, intense, as
though by the vigor of physical and mental force he would override any
charge or imputation.

Why? She drew herself up, as he quickly searched her eyes, bright with
the passions that stirred her breast.

"You told me part of your story that day in the property wagon," she
began, repugnance, scorn and anger all mingling in her tones. "Why did
you not tell me the rest?"

His glance, too, flashed. Would he still profess not to understand
her? His lips parted; he spoke with an effort.

"The rest?" he said, his brow lowering.

"Yes," she answered quickly; "the stain upon your name!--the garrison
sold!--the soldiers killed!--murdered!--"

She had turned to him swiftly, fiercely, with her last words, but
before the look of sudden shame and dread on his face, her eyes
abruptly fell as though a portion of his dishonor had inexplicably
touched her. He made no attempt to defend himself--motionless he stood
an instant--then, without a word, he moved away. At the threshold he
paused, but she did not look up--could not! A moment; an eternity!

"Why don't you go?" she cried. "Why don't you go?"

The door opened, closed; she was alone.

Pale as the dying lilies on the table, she stepped toward the
threshold, when Barnes, chipper and still indefatigable, entered by
another door. He was too inspired with festal intoxication to observe
her agitation.

"What, my dear!" he exclaimed cheerily. "Has he gone? Did you make up
your little differences? Did you settle your quarrel before he leaves
for Mexico?"

"For Mexico!" she repeated, mechanically.

"Of course. He has his commission in the army and leaves early in the
morning. But you look tired, my dear. I declare you are quite
pale"--pinching her cheek--"rest will bring back the roses, though."

Impulsively she threw her arms around his neck.

"Why, why, what's this?" he said, patting her head.

"I only care for you," she whispered. "My dear! My dear!"

CHAPTER XI

THE PASSING OF A FINE GENTLEMAN

"'Perhaps she will fail, and that will amuse me,'" ruminated François
on his high seat next to the coachman, repeating the marquis' words,
as they drove home after the nobleman's precipitous retreat from the
theater. "Well, he didn't look as though he had been particularly
amused. But no wonder he was startled! It even"--reviewing the
impression first made upon him at sight of the actress--"sent a shiver
through me!" Here the carriage drew up sharply before the marquis'
home, and François, hastily alighting, threw open the door.

"Eh? What? Are we here?" muttered the marquis, starting from the
corner where he had been reclining.

He arose with some difficulty; traversed the sidewalk and the
shell-strewn path to the house which loomed darkly before them; paused
at the foot of the stairs where he breathed heavily, complaining of
the oppressiveness of the air; and finally, with the assistance of the
valet, found himself once more in his room, the sick chamber he had
grown to detest! Here alone--having dismissed the servant as soon as
possible--he moved restlessly to and fro, pondering deeply. Since the
moment when he had seen and recognized his daughter, all the buoyancy
which had given his wasted figure a sort of galvanic vitality seemed
to vanish. It was like the exhaustion of a battery, the collapse of
the sustaining power.

"That resemblance can not be coincidence!" he thought. "Oh, errors of
the past, you come home in our old age when the limbs are faltering
and life is failing!"

Going to the _secrétaire_, he took out a box that had not been opened
in years, and, with trembling fingers, turned over many papers. He
shivered, and, thinking it was cold, stirred the fire. Returning to
the secretary, he took from the box a package tied with a ribbon
still, after the lapse of these many years, slightly fragrant, and he
breathed that perfume, so faint, so subtle, while recollections smote
him like a knife.

Its scent was familiar to him; it seemed to bring life to the dead,
and for the moment in his mind's eye he saw her glowing figure, the
love of his youth, with flashing, revengeful eyes and noble mien. He
cowered over the desk, as if shrinking from an avenging spirit, while
the perfume, like opium, filled his brain with strange fantasies. He
strove to drown remembrance, but some force--it seemed not his
own!--drove him irresistibly to untie that ribbon, to scrutinize many
old theater programs and to gaze upon a miniature in ivory depicting a
woman in the loveliness of her charms, but whose striking likeness to
the young actress he had just seen filled his heart with strange fear.
Some power--surely it could not have been his will which rebelled
strenuously!--impelled him to open those letters and to read them word
for word. The tenderness of the epistles fell on his heart as though
to scorch it, and he quivered like a guilty wretch. His eyes were
fascinated by these words in her last letter: "Should you desert me
and your unborn child, your end will be miserable. As I believe in
retribution, I am sure you will reap as you have sown."

Suddenly the reader in a frenzy threw the letter to the floor and
trampled on it. He regarded the face in the miniature with fear and
hatred, and dashing it into the drawer, called down maledictions on
her. He ceased abruptly, weak and wavering.

"I am going insane," he said, laughing harshly. "Fool! To let that
woman's memory disturb me. So much for her dire prophecy!" And he
snapped his fingers and dropped the letter in the fire.

"What can her curse avail?" he said aloud. "She is gone, turned to
ashes like that paper and there is no life after this one. All then is
nothing--emptiness--a blank! I need rest. It is this cursed dyspepsia
which has made me nervous. Something to compose me, and then to bed!"

In spite of soothing powders, however, he passed a restless night and
arose unrefreshed, but ordered his valet to bring one of his lightest
suits, and, having dressed, he set a white flower upon his coat, while
the servant proceeded to apply various pigments to the wrinkled face,
until it took on a mocking semblance to the countenance of a man
fifteen years younger. The marquis leered at himself in the pier-glass
and assumed a jauntiness of demeanor he was far from feeling.

"I do not look tired or worried, François?"

"Not at all, my lord," replied the obsequious valet. "I never saw you,
my lord, appear so young and well."

"Beneath the surface, François, there is age and weakness," answered
the marquis in a melancholy tone.

"It is but a passing indisposition, my lord," asserted the servant,
soothingly.

"Perhaps. But, François"--peering around--"as I look over my shoulder,
do you know what I see?"

The almost hideous expression of the roué's face alarmed the servant.

"No, my lord, what is it?"

"A figure stands there in black and is touching me. It is the spirit
of death, François. You can not see it, but there it is--"

"My lord, you speak wildly."

"I have seen some strange things, François. The dead have arisen. And
I have received my warning. Soon I shall join those dark specters
which once gaily traversed this bright world. A little brandy and
soda, François."

The servant brought it to him. The marquis leered awfully over his
shoulder once more. "Your health, my guest!" he exclaimed, laughing
harshly. "But my hat, François; I have business to perform, important
business!"

He ambled out of the room. On the street he was all politeness,
removing his hat to a dark brunette who rolled by in her carriage, and
pausing to chat with another representative of the sex of the blond
type. Then he gaily sauntered on, until reaching the theater he
stopped and made a number of inquiries. Who was the manager of
Constance Carew? Where was he to be found? "At the St. Charles hotel?"
He was obliged to Monsieur, the ticket-seller, and wished him
good-day.

Entering the hotel, he sent his card to Barnes, requesting an
interview, and the manager, overcome by the honor of such a visit,
responded with alacrity. The customary formalities over, the nobleman
congratulated Barnes on the performance and led the conversation to
the young actress.

"Pardon my curiosity," he said, with apparent carelessness, "but I'm
sure I remember an actress of the same name in London--many years
ago?"

"Her mother, undoubtedly," replied the manager, proudly.

"She was married, was she not, to--"

"A scoundrel who took her for his wife in one church and repudiated
the ties through another denomination!"

"Ah, a French-English marriage!" said the marquis, blandly. "An old
device! But what was this lover's name?"

"This husband's, my lord!"

"Lover or husband, I fancy it is all the same to her now," sneered the
caller. "She has passed the point where reputation matters."

"Her reputation is my concern, Monsieur le Marquis!"

"You knew her?" asked the nobleman, as though the conversation wearied
him. "And she was faithful to his memory? No scandals--none of those
little affairs women of her class are prone to? There"--as Barnes
started up indignantly--"spare me your reproaches! I'm too feeble to
quarrel. Besides, what is it to me? I was only curious about her--that
is all! But she never spoke the name of her husband?"

"Not even to her own child!"

"She does not know her father's name?" repeated the marquis. "But I
thank you; Mademoiselle Constance is so charming I must needs call to
ask if she were related to the London actress! Good-day, Monsieur! You
are severe on the lover. Was it not the fashion of the day for the
actresses to take lovers, or for the fops to have an opera girl or a
comedienne? Did your most popular performers disdain such diversions?"
he sneered. "_Pardie_, the world has suddenly become moral! A
gentleman can no longer, it would seem, indulge in gentlemanly
follies."

Mumbling about the decadence of fashion, the marquis departed, his
manner so strange the manager gazed after him in surprise.

With no thought of direction, his lips moving, talking to himself in
adynamic fashion, the nobleman walked mechanically on until he reached
the great cathedral. The organ was rolling and voices arose sweet as
those of seraphim. He hesitated at the portal and then laughed to
himself. "Well has Voltaire said: 'Pleasure has its time; so, too, has
wisdom. Make love in thy youth, and in old age, attend to thy
salvation.'" He repeated the latter words, but, although he paused at
the threshold and listened, he did not enter.

As he stood there, uncertain and trembling, a figure replete with
youth and vigor approached, and, glancing at her, an exclamation
escaped him that caused her to pause and turn.

"You are not well," she said, solicitously. "Can I help you?"

"It is nothing, nothing!" answered the marquis, ashy pale at the sight
of her and the proximity of that face which regarded him with womanly
sympathy. "Go away."

"At least, let me assist you. You were going to the cathedral? Come!"

His hand rested upon her strong young arm; he felt himself too weak to
resist, so, together--father and daughter!--they entered the
cathedral. Side by side they knelt--he to keep up the farce, fearing
to undeceive her--while yet only mocking words came to the old man's
heart, as the bitterness of the situation overwhelmed him. She was a
daughter in whom a prince might have found pride, but he remained
there mute, not daring to speak, experiencing all the tortures of
remorse and retribution. Of what avail had been ambition? How had it
overleaped content and ease of mind! Into what a nest of stings and
thorns his loveless marriage had plunged him! And now but the black
shadow remained; he walked in the darkness of unending isolation. So
he should continue to walk straight to the door of death.

He scarcely heard the organ or the voice of the priest. The high
altar, with its many symbols, suggested the thousands that had
worshiped there and gone away comforted. Here was abundant testimony
of the blessings of divine mercy in the numerous costly gifts and in
the discarded crutches, and here faith had manifested itself for
generations.

The marquis' throat was hoarse; he could have spoken no words if he
had tried. He laughed in his heart at the gifts of the grateful ones;
those crosses of ivory and handsome lamps were but symbols of
barbarism and superstition. The tablets, with their inscriptions,
_"Merci"_ and _"Ex voto,"_ were to him absurd, and he gibed at the
simple credulity of the people who could thus be misled. All these
evidences of thanksgiving were but cumulative testimony that men and
women are like little children, who will be pleased over fairy tales
or frightened over ghost stories. The promise of paradise, but the
fairy tale told by priests to men and women; the threats of
punishment, the ghost stories to awe them! A malicious delight crept
into his diseased imagination that he alone in the cathedral possessed
the extreme divination, enabling him to perceive the emptiness of all
these signs and symbols. He labored in a fever of mental excitement
and was only recalled to himself as his glance once more rested upon
the young girl.

He became dimly conscious that people were moving past them, and he
suddenly longed to cry out, "My child!" but he fought down the
impulse. There could be no turning back now at the eleventh hour; the
marquis was a philosopher, and did not believe that, in a twinkling of
an eye, a man may set behind all that has transpired and regard it as
naught. Something within held him from speaking to her--perhaps his
own inherent sense of the consistency of things; his appreciation of
the legitimate finale to a miserable order of circumstances! Even
pride forbade departure from long-established habit. But while this
train of thought passed through his mind, he realized she was
regarding him with clear, compassionate eyes, and he heard her voice:

"Shall we go now? The services are over."

He obeyed without question.

"Over!"

Those moments by her side would never return! They were about to part
to meet no more on earth. He leaned heavily upon her arm and his steps
were faltering. Out into the warm sunshine they passed, the light
revealing more plainly the ravages of time in his face.

"You must take a carriage," she said to the old man.

"Thank you, thank you," he replied. "Leave me here on the bench. I
shall soon be myself. I am only a little weak. You are good to an old
man. May I not"--asking solely for the pleasure of hearing her
speak--"may I not know the name of one who is kind to an old man?"

"My name is Constance Carew."

He shook as with the palsy. "A good name, a good name!" he repeated.
"I remember years ago another of that name--an actress in London. A
very beautiful woman, and good! But even she had her detractors and
none more bitter than the man who wronged her. You--you resemble her!
But there, don't let me detain you. I shall do very well here. You are
busy, I dare say."

"Yes, I should be at rehearsal," she replied regretfully.

"At rehearsal!" he repeated. "Yes!--yes!--. But the stage is no place
for you!" he added, suddenly. "You should leave it--leave it!"

She looked at him wonderingly. "Is there nothing more I can do for
you?"

"Nothing! Nothing! Except--no, nothing!"

"You were about to ask something?" she observed with more sympathy.

"If you would not think me presuming--if you would not deem it an
offense--you remind me of one I loved and lost--it is so long ago
since I felt her kiss for the last time--I am so near the grave--"

With tears in her eyes, she bent her head and her fresh young lips
just touched his withered brow.

"Good-by," she said. "I am so sorry for you!" And she was gone,
leaving him sitting there motionless as though life had departed.

A rattling cab that clattered noisily past the cabildo and calaboza,
and swung around the square, aroused the marquis. He arose, stopped
the driver, and entered the rickety vehicle.

"The law office of Marks and Culver," said the marquis.

The man lashed his horse and the attenuated quadruped flew like a
winged Pegasus, soon drawing up before the attorneys' office.
Fortunately Culver was in, and, although averse to business on any
day--thinking more of his court-yard and his fountain than of his law
books--this botanist-solicitor made shift to comply with the marquis'
instructions and reluctantly earned a modest fee. He even refused to
express surprise at my lord's story; one wife in London, another in
Paris; why, many a southern gentleman had two families--quadroons
being plentiful, why not? Culver unobtrusively yawned, and, with fine
courtesy, bowed the marquis out.

Slowly the latter retraced his steps to his home; his feet were heavy
as lead; his smile was forced; he glanced frequently over his
shoulder, possessed by a strange fantasy.

"I think I will lie down a little," he said to his valet. "In this
easy chair; that will do. I am feeling well; only tired. How that mass
is repeated in my mind! That is because it is Palestrina, François;
not because it is a vehicle to salvation, employed by the gibbering
priests. Never let your heart rule your head, boy. Don't mistake
anything for reality. 'What have you seen in your travels?' was asked
of Sage Evemere. 'Follies!' was the reply. 'Follies, follies
everywhere!' We never live; we are always in the expectation of
living."

He made an effort to smile which was little more than a grimace.

"A cigar, François!"

"My lord, are you well?--"

The marquis flew into a rage and the valet placed an imported weed in
his master's hand.

"A light, François!"

The valet obeyed. For a moment the strong cigar seemed to soothe the
old man, although his hand shook like an aspen as he held it.

"Now, bring me my Voltaire," commanded the marquis. "The volume on the
table, idiot! Ah! here is what I wish: 'It takes twenty years to bring
man from the state of embryo, and from that of a mere criminal, as he
is in his first infancy, to the point when his reason begins to dawn.
It has taken thirty centuries to know his structure; it would take
eternity to know something of the soul; it takes but an instant to
kill him.' But an instant; but an instant!" he repeated.

He puffed feebly at the cigar.

"It is cold here, François."

The servant consulted the thermometer.

"It is five degrees warmer than you are accustomed to, my lord," he
replied.

"Bring me the thermometer," commanded the old man. "You should not
lie, François. It is a bad fault in servants. Leave it to your
masters; it is a polite vice. The privilege of the world's potentates,
diplomats and great people. Never fall into the rut of lying,
François, or you will soon outlive your usefulness as a valet."

"You can see that I speak the truth, my lord," was the response, as
calm as ever, for nothing disturbed or ruffled this ideal servant.

He held out the thermometer for the marquis' inspection and the latter
examined it carefully. The cigar fell from his fingers to the floor.
The attentive valet picked it up and threw it into the grate.

"I believe, François," stammered the marquis, "that the fault lies
with me. It is I--I, who am growing cold like death."

"Yes, my lord," answered the calm and imperturbable servant.

"'Yes?' you blockhead!" shrieked the master. "Do you know what you are
saying?"

"Well, no, then, my lord," responded the unmoved valet.

"Yes and no!" shouted the marquis in a voice that was wildly
discordant. "What do you mean?"

"Whatever my lord pleases," was the quiet response.

"_Mon Dieu_! I'll discharge you."

The servant only smiled.

"Why did you smile?"

"Oh, my lord--"

"Was it not that you thought it a good joke for a dying man to
discharge his servant?"

"My lord is quick to catch the humorous side of anything," returned
François.

"Begone, idiot! You are waiting for my death to discharge you. I can
see it in your eyes. Yet stay, François, for, if you leave me, I shall
be alone. You will not leave me?"

"As my lord desires," was François' response.

"I imagine I should feel better if I had my footbath."

The servant removed the shoes and silken stockings from his master's
feet and propped him up in a chair, throwing a blanket over his
shoulders and heaping more wood upon the fire in the grate.

"More fire, you idiot!" cried the marquis, peevishly. "Do you not see
that I am freezing?"

"It is ten degrees above the temperature my lord always ordered,"
retorted François, coolly.

"Ten degrees! Oh, you wish to remind me that the end is approaching?
You do not dare deny it!" The valet shrugged his shoulders.

"But I am not gone yet." He wagged his head cunningly and began to
laugh to himself. His mind apparently rambled, for he started to chant
a French love song in a voice that had long since lost its capacity
for a sustained tone. The words were distinct, although the melody was
broken, and the spectacle was gruesome enough. As he concluded he
looked at the valet as if for approbation and began to mumble about
his early love affairs.

"Bah, François," he said shrilly, "I'll be up to-morrow as gay as
ever. _Vive l'amour! vive la joie!_ It was a merry life we led, eh,
François?"

"Merry indeed, my lord."

"It kept you busy, François. There was the little peasant girl on the
Rhine. What flaxen hair she had and eyes like the sky! Yet a word of
praise--a little flattery--"

"My lord was irresistible," said the valet with mild sarcasm.

"Let me see, François, what became of her?"

"She drowned herself in the river."

"That is true. I had forgotten. Well, life is measured by pleasures,
not by years, and I was the prince of coxcombs. Up at ten o'clock;
no sooner on account of the complexion; then visits from the
tradespeople and a drive in the park to look at the ladies. It was
there I used to meet the English actress. 'Twas there, with her, I
vowed the park was a garden of Eden! What a scene, when my barrister
tried to settle the case! Fortunately a marriage in England was not
a marriage in France. I saw her last night, François"--with an
insane look--"in the flesh and blood; as life-like as the night
before we took the stage for Brighton!" Suddenly he shrieked and a
look of terror replaced the vain, simpering expression.

"There, François!" Glancing with awe behind him. And truly there stood
a dark shadow; a gruesome presence. His face became distorted and he
lapsed into unconsciousness.

The valet gazed at him with indifference. Then he went to an inner
room and brought a valise which he began packing carefully and
methodically. After he had completed this operation he approached the
dressing table and took up a magnificent jeweled watch, which he
examined for a moment before thrusting it into his pocket. A snuff
box, set with diamonds, and several rings followed. François with the
same deliberation opened a drawer and took out a small box which he
tried to open, and, failing, forced the lid with the poker. At this,
my lord opened his eyes, and, in a weak voice, for his strength had
nearly deserted him, demanded:

"What are you doing, François?"

"Robbing you, my lord," was the slow and dignified response.

The marquis' eyes gleamed with rage. He endeavored to call out, but
his voice failed him and he fell back, trembling and overcome.

"Thief! Ingrate!" he hissed, hoarsely.

"I beg you not to excite yourself, my lord," said the stately valet.
"You are already very weak and it will hasten the end."

"Is this the way you repay me?"

"My lord will not need these things soon."

"Have you no gratitude?" stammered the marquis, whose physical and
mental condition was truly pitiable.

"Gratitude for having been called 'idiot,' 'dog,' and 'blockhead'
nearly all my life! I am somewhat lacking in that quality, I fear."

"Is there no shame in you?"

"Shame?" repeated François, as he proceeded to ransack another drawer.
"There might have been before I went into your service, my lord. Yes;
once I felt shame for you. It was years ago, in London, when you
deserted your beautiful wife. When I saw how she worshiped you and
what a noble woman she was, I confess I felt ashamed that I served one
of the greatest blackguards in Europe--"

"Oh, you scoundrel--" exclaimed the marquis, his face becoming a
ghastly hue.

"Be calm, my lord. You really are in need of all your energy. For
years I have submitted to your shameful service. I have been at the
beck and call of one of the greatest roués and villains in France.
Years of such association would somewhat soil any nature. Another
thing, my lord, I must tell you, since you and I are settling our last
accounts. For years I have endured your miserable King Louis Philippe.
A king? Bah! He fled from the back door! A coward, who shaved his
whiskers for a disguise."

"No more, rascal!"

"Rascal yourself, you worn-out, driveling breath of corruption! It is
so pleasant to exercise a gentleman's privilege of invective! Ah, here
is the purse. _Au revoir_, my lord. A pleasant dissolution!"

But by this time the marquis was speechless, and François, taking the
valise in hand, deferentially left the room. He locked the door behind
him and thrust the key into his pocket.

CHAPTER XII

IN THE OLD CEMETERY

The engagement at the new St. Charles was both memorable and
profitable, The Picayune, before the fifties, an audacious sheet,
being especially kind to the players. "This paper," said a writer of
the day, "was as full of witticisms as one of Thackeray's dreams after
a light supper, and, as for Editors Straws and Phazma, they are poets
who eat, talk and think rhyme." The Picayune contained a poem
addressed to Miss Carew, written by Straws in a cozy nook in the
veranda at the Lake End, with his absinthe before him and the remains
of an elaborate repast about him. It was then quite the fashion to
write stanzas to actresses; the world was not so prosaic as it is now,
and even the president of the United States, John Quincy Adams, penned
graceful verses to a fair ward of Thalia.

One noon, a few days after the opening performance, several members of
the company were late for rehearsal and Barnes strode impatiently to
and fro, glancing at his watch and frowning darkly. To avenge himself
for the remissness of the players, he roared at the stage carpenters
who were constructing a balcony and to the supers who were shifting
flats to the scenery room. The light from an open door at the back of
the stage dimly illumined the scene; overhead, in the flies, was
intense darkness; while in front, the auditorium yawned like a chasm,
in no wise suggestive of the brilliant transformation at night.

"Ugh!" said Susan, standing in one of the entrances. "It is like
playing to ghosts! Fancy performing to an audience of specters!
Perhaps the phantoms of the past really do assemble in their old
places on occasions like this. Only you can't hear them applaud or
laugh."

"Are you looking for admirers among ghosts?" remarked Hawkes,
ironically.

"Don't," she returned, with a little shiver.

"So, ladies and gentlemen, you are all here at last?" exclaimed
Barnes, interrupting this cheerful conversation. "Some of you are late
again to-day. It must not happen again. Go to Victor's, Moreau's, or
Miguel's, as much as you please. If you have a headache or a heartache
in consequence, that is your own affair, but I am not to be kept
waiting the next day."

"Victor's, indeed!" retorted the elastic old lady. "As if--"

"No one supposed, Madam, that at your age"--began the manager.

"At my age! If you think--"

"Are you all ready?" interrupted Barnes, hastily, knowing he would be
worsted in any argument with this veteran player. "Then clear the
stage! Act first!" And the rehearsal began.

If the audience were specters, the performers moved, apparently
without rhyme or reason, mere shadows on the dimly lighted stage;
enacting some semblance to scenes of mortal life; their jests and
gibes, unnatural in that comparatively empty place; their voices, out
of the semi-darkness, like those of spirits rehearsing acts of long
ago. In the evening it would all become an amusing, bright-colored
reality, but now the barrenness of the scenes was forcibly apparent.

"That will do for to-day," said the manager at the conclusion of the
last act. "To-morrow, ladies and gentlemen, at the same time. And any
one who is late--will be fined!"

"Changing the piece every few nights is all work and no play,"
complained Susan.

"It will keep you out of mischief, my dear," replied Barnes, gathering
up his manuscripts.

"Oh, I don't know about that!" returned Miss Susan, with a defiant
toss of the head, as she moved toward the dressing-room where they
had left their wraps. It was a small apartment, fairly bright and
cheery, with here and there a portrait against the wall. Above the
dressing-table hung a mirror, diamond-scratched with hieroglyphic
scrawls, among which could be discerned a transfixed heart, spitted
like a lark on an arrow, and an etching of Lady Gay Spanker, with
cork-screw curls. Taglioni, in pencil caricature, her limbs
"divinely slender," gyrated on her toes in reckless abandon above
this mute record of names now forgotten.

"What lovely roses, Constance!" exclaimed Susan, as she entered,
bending over a large bouquet on one of the chairs. "From the count, I
presume?"

"Yes," indifferently answered the young girl, who was adjusting her
hat before the mirror.

"How attentive he is!" cooed Susan, her tones floating in a higher
register. "Poor man! Enjoy yourself while you may, my dear," she went
on. "When youth is gone, what is left? Women should sow their wild
oats as well as men. I don't call them wild oats, though, but
paradisaical oats. The Elysian fields are strewn with them."

As she spoke, her glance swept her companion searchingly, and, in that
brief scrutiny, Susan observed with inward complacency how pale the
other was, and how listless her manner! Their common secret, however,
made Susan's outward demeanor sweetly solicitous and gently
sympathetic. Her mind, passing in rapid review over recent events,
dwelt not without certain satisfaction upon results. True, every night
she was still forced to witness Constance's success, which of itself
was wormwood and gall to Susan, to stand in the wings and listen to
the hateful applause; but the conviction that the sweets of popular
favor brought not what they were expected to bring, was, in a way, an
antidote to Susan's dissatisfaction.

A little knowledge is a dangerous thing and can sometimes be made
annoying; in Susan's case it was a weapon sharpened with honeyed
phrase and consolatory bearing, for she was not slow to discover nor
to avail herself of the irritating power this knowledge gave her.
Constance's pride and reticence, however, made it difficult for Susan
to discern when her shafts went true. Moreover, although harboring no
suspicion of Susan's dissimulation, she instinctively held aloof from
her and remained coldly unresponsive. Perhaps in the depths of Susan's
past lurked something indefinable which threw its shadow between them,
an inscrutable impediment; and her inability to penetrate the young
actress' reserve, however she might wound her, awakened Susan's
resentment. But she was too world-wise to display her irritation. She
even smiled sweetly now, as confidante to confidante, and, turning to
her impulsively, said:

"Let me help you on with your cloak, dear?"

Out of the quiet, deserted theater, isolated from external din, to the
busy streets, where drays went thundering by, and industry manifested
itself in resounding clatter, was a sudden, but not altogether
unwelcome, change to Constance. Without waiting for the manager, who
paused at the rear entrance to impress his final instructions upon a
stolid-looking property-man, she turned quickly into the noisy
thoroughfares.

On and on her restlessness led her, conscious of the clangor of
vehicles and voices and yet remote from them; past those picturesque
suggestions of the one-time Spanish rulers in which the antiquarian
could detect evidence of remote Oriental infusion; past the silken
seductions of shops, where ladies swarmed and hummed like bees around
the luscious hive; past the idlers' resorts, from whence came the
rat-a-tat of clinking billiard balls and the louder rumble of falling
ten-pins.

In a window of one of these places, a club with a reputation for
exclusiveness, a young man was seated, newspaper in hand, a cup of
black coffee on a small table before him, and the end of a cigar
smoking on the tray where he had placed it. With a yawn, he had just
thrown aside the paper and was reaching for the thick, dark
beverage--his hand thin and nervous--when, glancing without, he caught
sight of the actress in the crowd. Obeying a sudden impulse, he arose,
picking up his hat which lay on a chair beside him.

"Yo' order am ready in a moment, Mr. Mauville," said a colored
servant, hurrying toward the land baron as the latter was leaving.

"I've changed my mind and don't want it," replied the other curtly.

And sauntering down the steps of the club with ill-concealed
impatience, he turned in the direction the young girl had taken,
keeping her retreating figure in view; now, so near her in the crowded
street, he could almost touch her; then, as they left the devious
ways, more distant, but ever with his eyes bent upon her. He had
almost spoken, when in the throng he approached within arm's length,
but something--he knew not what--restrained him, and a press of people
separated them. Only for a moment, and then he continued the
questionable pleasure of following her.

Had she turned, she would probably have seen her pursuer, but absorbed
in thought, she continued on her way, unconscious of his presence. On
and on she hurried, until she reached the tranquil outskirts and
lingered before the gate of one of the cemeteries. At the same time
the land baron slackened his footsteps, hesitating whether to advance
or turn back. After a moment's indecision, she entered the cemetery;
her figure, receding in the distance, was becoming more and more
indistinct, when he started forward quickly and also passed through
the gate.

The annual festival of the dead, following All Saint's day, was being
observed in the burial ground. This commemoration of those who have
departed in the communion--described by Tertullian in the second
century as an "apostolic tradition," so old was the sacrifice!--was
celebrated with much pomp and variety in the Crescent City. In the
vicinity of the cemetery gathered many colored _marchandes_, their
heads and shoulders draped in shawls and fichus of bright, diversified
hues; before them, perambulating booths with baskets of molasses candy
or _pain-patate_. Women, dressed in mourning, bore to the tomb flowers
and plants, trays of images, wreaths, crosses, anchors of dried
immortelles and artificial roses. Some were accompanied by priests and
acolytes with censers, the former intoning the service:

                   Fidelium Deus omnium conditor--

A solemn peace fell upon the young girl as she entered and she seemed
to leave behind her all disturbing emotions, finding refuge in the
supreme tranquillity of this ancient city of the dead. She was
surrounded by a resigned grief, a sorrow so dignified that it did not
clash with the sweeter influences of nature. The monotonous sound of
the words of the priests harmonized with the scene. The tongue of a
nation that had been resolved into the elements was fitting in this
place, where time and desolation had left their imprint in discolored
marble, inscriptions almost effaced, and clambering vines.

                        --Animabus famulorum--

To many the words so mournfully intoned brought solace and surcease
from sorrow. The sisters of charity moved among the throng with grave,
pale faces, mere shadows of their earthly selves, as though they had
undergone the first stage of the great metamorphosis which is
promised. To them, who had already buried health, vitality and
passion, was not this chant to the dead, this strange intoning of
words, sweeter than the lullaby crooned by a nurse to a child, more
stirring than the patriotic hymn to a soldier, and fraught with more
fervor than the romantic dream of a lover?

              Ut indulgentiam, quam semper optaverunt--

The little orphan children heard and heeded no more than the butterfly
which lighted upon the engraven words, "Dust to dust," and poised
gracefully, as it bathed in the sunshine, stretching its wings in
wantonness of beauty.

                 Piis supplicationibus consequantur--

Now Constance smiled to see the little ones playing on the steps of a
monument. It was the tomb of a great jurist, a man of dignity during
his mundane existence, his head crammed with those precepts which are
devised for the temporal well-being of that fabric, sometimes termed
society, and again, civilization. The poor waifs, with suppressed
laughter--they dared not give full vent to their merriment with the
black-robed sisters not far away--ran around the steps, unmindful of
the inscription which might have been written by a Johnson, and as
unconscious of unseemly conduct as the insects that hummed in the
grass.

"Hush!" whispered one of the sisters, as a funeral cortège approached.

The children, wide-eyed in awe and wonder, desisted in their play.

"It is an old man who died last night," said a nun in a low voice to
Constance, noticing her look of inquiry.

The silver crucifix shone fitfully ahead, while the chanting of the
priests, winding in and out after the holy symbol, fell upon the ear.
And the young girl gazed with pity as the remains of the Marquis de
Ligne, her father, were borne by.

                Qui vivis et regnas. Glorificamus te.

CHAPTER XIII

AN INCONGRUOUS RÔLE

Longer and longer trailed the shadow of a tall tombstone until, as the
sun went down, it merged into the general twilight like a life
lengthening out and out and finally blending in restful darkness. With
that transition came a sudden sense of isolation and loneliness; the
little burial ground seemed the world; the sky, its walls and
ceiling.

From the neighborhood of the gates had vanished the dusky venders,
trundling their booths and stalls citywards. As abruptly had
disappeared the bearers of flowers and artificial roses with baskets
poised upon their heads, imparting to their figures dignity and
erectness. The sad-eyed nuns had wended their way out of the little
kingdom of the departed, surrounded by the laughing children and
preceded by the priests and acolytes. All the sounds and activities of
the day--the merriment of the little ones, the oblations of the
priests, the greetings of friends--were followed by inertness and
languor. Motionless against the sky spread the branches of the trees,
like lines etched there; still were the clambering vines that clasped
monolith and column.

But suddenly that death-like lull in nature's animation and unrest was
abruptly broken, and an uproarious vociferation dispelled the
voiceless peace.

                 "For Jack ashore's a Croesus, lads,
                   With a Jill for every Jack--"

sang a hoarse voice as its owner came staggering along one of the
walks of the cemetery; for all his song, no blue-water sailor-man, but
a boisterous denizen of the great river, a raftsman or a keel-boatman,
who had somehow found himself in the burial ground and now was beating
aimlessly about. How this rollicking waif of the grog shop came to
wander so far from the convivial haunts of his kind and to choose this
spot for a ramble, can only be explained by the vagaries of
inebriety.

                      "With a Jill in your wake,
                      A fair port you'll make--"

he continued, when his eye fell upon the figure of a woman, some
distance ahead, and fairly discernible in the gathering twilight.
Immediately the song ceased and he steadied himself, gazing
incredulously after the form that had attracted his attention.

"Hello!" he said. "Avast, my dear!" he called out.

Echoing in that still place, his harsh tones produced a startling
effect, and the figure before him moved faster and faster, casting a
glance behind her at the man from the river, who with snatches of
song, started in uncertain but determined pursuit. As the heavy
footsteps sounded nearer, she increased her pace, with eyes bent upon
the distant gate; darker seemed to grow the way; more menacing the
shadows outstretched across the path. Louder crunched the boots on the
shell walk; more audible became the words of the song that flowed from
his lips, when the sound of a sudden and violent altercation replaced
the hoarse-toned cadence, an altercation that was of brief duration,
characterized by longshoreman oaths, and followed by silence; and then
a figure, not that of the tuneful waterman, sprang to the side of the
startled girl.

"Miss Carew!" exclaimed a well-remembered voice.

Bewildered, breathing quickly, she gazed from Edward Mauville, who
thus unexpectedly accosted her, to the prostrate form, lying
motionless on the road. The rude awakening from her day-dream in the
hush of that peaceful place, and the surprising sequence had dazed her
senses, and, for the moment, it seemed something tragic must have
happened.

"Is he dead?" she asked quickly, unable to withdraw her glance from
the immovable figure, stretched out in the dim light on the path.

"No fear!" said Mauville, quietly, almost thoughtfully, although his
eyes were yet bright from the encounter. "You can't kill his kind," he
added, contemptuously. "Brutes from coal barges, or raftsmen from the
head waters! He struck against a stone when he fell, and what with
that, and the liquor in him, will rest there awhile. He'll come to
without remembering what has happened."

Turning moodily, the land baron walked slowly down the road, away from
the gate; she thought he was about to leave her, when he paused, as
though looking for something, stooped to the ground, and returned,
holding out a garment.

"You dropped your wrap, Miss Carew," he said, awkwardly. "The night is
cold and you will need it." She offered no resistance when he placed
it over her shoulders; indeed, seemed unconscious of the attention.

"Don't you think we had better go?" he went on. "It won't hurt
him"--indicating the motionless body--"to stay here--the brute!"

But as he spoke, with some constraint, her eyes, full of doubts, met
his, and he felt a flush mantle his face. The incongruity of his
position appealed forcibly to him. Had he not been watching and
following her himself? Seeing her helpless, alone, in the silent spot,
where she had unconsciously lingered too long, had he not been almost
on the point of addressing her? Moved by vague desires, had he not
already started impetuously toward her, when the man from the river
had come rollicking along and insinuated himself after his fashion in
the other's rôle?

And at the sight--the fleeing girl, the drunken, profane waterman!--how
his heart had leaped and his body had become steel for the encounter;
an excess of vigor for a paltry task! Jack, as he called himself, might
have been a fighting-man earlier in the day, but now he had gone down
like straw. When the excitement of this brief collision was over,
however, the land baron found his position as unexpected as puzzling.

As these thoughts swiftly crossed his mind, he could not forbear a
bitter laugh, and she, walking more quickly toward the gate, regarded
him with inquiry, not perhaps unmingled with apprehension. A picture
of events, gone by, arose before her like a menacing shadow over the
present. He interpreted her glance for what it meant, and angry that
she doubted him, angry with himself, said roughly:

"Oh, you haven't anything to fear!"

Her answering look was so gentle, so sad, an unwonted feeling of
compunction seized him; he repented of his harshness, and added less
brusquely:

"Why did you remain so late?"

"I did not realize how late it had become."

"Your thoughts must have been very absorbing!" he exclaimed quickly,
his brow once more overcast.

Not difficult was it for him to surmise upon whom her mind had been
bent, and involuntarily his jaw set disagreeably, while he looked at
her resentfully. In that light he could but dimly discern her face.
Her bonnet had fallen from her head; her eyes were bent before her, as
though striving to penetrate the gathering darkness. With his sudden
spell of jealousy came the temptation to clasp her in his arms in that
silent, isolated place, but the figure of the sailor came between him
and the desire, while pride, the heritage of the gentleman, fought
down the longing. This self-conquest was not accomplished, however,
without a sacrifice of temper, for after a pause, he observed:

"There is no accounting for a woman's taste!"

She did not controvert this statement, but the start she gave told him
the shaft had sped home.

"An outlaw! An outcast!" exclaimed the patroon, stung beyond endurance
by his thoughts.

Still no reply; only more hurried footsteps! Around them sounded a
gentle rustling; a lizard scrambled out of their path through the
crackling leaves; a bat, or some other winged creature, suddenly
whirred before them and vanished. They had now approached the gate,
through which they passed and found themselves on the road leading
directly to the city, whose lights had already begun to twinkle in the
dusk.

The cheering rumble of a carriage and the aspect of the not
far-distant town quickened her spirits and imparted elasticity to her
footsteps. Upon the land baron they produced an opposite effect, for
he was obviously reluctant to abandon the interview, however
unsatisfactory it might be. There was nothing to say, and yet he was
loath to leave her; there was nothing to accomplish, and yet he wished
to remain with her. For this reason, as they drew near the city, his
mood became darker, like the night around them. Instinctively, she
felt the turbulent passions stirring in his bosom; his sudden silence,
his dogged footsteps reawakened her misgivings. Furtively she regarded
him, but his eyes were fixed straight before him on the soft luster
above the city, the reflection of the lights, and she knew and
mistrusted his thoughts. Although she found his silence more menacing
than his words, she could think of nothing to say to break the spell,
and so they continued to walk mutely side by side. An observer, seeing
them beneath the cypress, a lovers' promenade, with its soft,
enfolding shadows, would have taken them for a well-matched couple,
who had no need for language.

But when they had emerged from that romantic lane and entered the
city, the land baron breathed more freely. She was now surrounded by
movement and din; the seclusion of the country gave way to the stir of
the city; she was no longer dependent on his good offices; his rôle of
protector had ended when they left the cypress walk behind them.

His brow cleared; he glanced at her with ill-concealed admiration; he
noticed with secret pride the attention she attracted from passers-by,
the sidelong looks of approval that followed her through the busy
streets. The land baron expanded into his old self; he strode at her
side, gratified by the scrutiny she invited; assurance radiated from
his eyes like some magnetic heat; he played at possession wilfully,
perversely. "Why not," whispered Hope. "A woman's mind is shifting
ever. Her fancy--a breath! The other is gone. Why--"

"It was not accident my being in the cemetery, Miss Carew," said
Mauville, suddenly covering her with his glance. Meeting her look of
surprise unflinchingly, he continued: "I followed you there; through
the streets, into the country! My seeing you first was chance; my
presence in the burial ground the result of that chance. The
inevitable result!" he repeated softly. "As inevitable as life! Life;
what is it? Influences which control us; forces which bind us! It is
you, or all; you or nothing!"

She did not reply; his voice, vibrating with feeling, touched no
answering chord. Nevertheless, a new, inexplicable wave of sorrow
moved her. It might be he had cared for her as sincerely as it was
possible for his wayward heart to care for any one. Perhaps time would
yet soften his faults, and temper his rashness. With that shade of
sorrow for him there came compassion as well; compassion that
overlooked the past and dwelt on the future.

She raised her steady eyes. "Why should it be 'I or nothing,' as you
put it?" she finally answered slowly. "Influences may control us in a
measure, but we may also strive for something. We can always strive."

"For what? For what we don't want? That's the philosophy of your
moralists, Miss Carew," he exclaimed. "That's your modern ethics of
duty. Playing tricks with happiness! The game isn't worth the candle.
Or, if you believe in striving," he added, half resentfully, half
imploringly, "strive to care for me but a little. But a little!" he
said again. "I who once wanted all, and would have nothing but all, am
content to ask, to plead, for but a little."

"I see no reason," she replied, wearily, yet not unkindly, "why we
should not be friends."

"Friends!" he answered, bitterly. "I do not beg for a loaf, but
a crumb. Yet you refuse me that! I will wait! Only a word of
encouragement! Will you not give it?"

She turned and looked into his eyes, and, before she spoke, he knew
what her answer would be.

"How can I?" she said, simply. "Why should I promise something I can
never fulfil?"

He held her glance as though loath to have it leave him.

"May I see you again?" he asked, abruptly.

She shook her head. His gaze fell, seeing no softening in her clear
look.

"You are well named," he repeated, more to himself than to her.
"Constance! You are constant in your dislikes as well as your likes."

"I have no dislike for you," she replied. "It seems to have been left
behind me somewhere."

"Only indifference, then!" he said, dully.

"No; not indifference!"

"You do care what--may become of me?"

"You should do so much--be so much in the world," she answered,
thoughtfully.

"_Sans peur et sans reproche!_" he cried, half-amused, half-cheerlessly.
"What a pity I met you--too late!"

They were now at the broad entrance of the brilliantly-lighted hotel.
Several loungers, smoking their after-dinner cigars, gazed at the
couple curiously.

"Mauville's a lucky dog," said one.

"Yes; he was born with a silver spoon," replied the person addressed.

As he passed through the envious throng, the land baron had regained
his self-command, although his face was marked with an unusual pallor.
In his mind one thought was paramount--that the walk begun at the
burial-ground was drawing to an end; their last walk; the finale of
all between them! Yet he could call to mind nothing further to say.
His story had been told; the conclusion reached. She, too, had spoken,
and he knew she would never speak differently. Bewildered and unable
to adjust his new and strange feelings, it dawned upon him he had
never understood himself and her; that he had never really known what
love was, and he stood abashed, confronted by his own ignorance.
Passion, caprice, fancy, he had seen depth in their shallows, but now
looked down and discerned the pebbly bottom. All this and much more
surged through his brain as he made his way through the crowd, and,
entering the corridor of the hotel, took formal leave of the young
girl at the stairway.

"Good-night, Miss Carew," he said, gravely.

"Good-night," she replied. And then, on the steps, she turned and
looked down at him, extending her hand: "Thank you!"

That half-timid, low "thank you!" he knew was all he would ever
receive from her. He hardly felt the hand-clasp; he was hardly
conscious when she turned away. A heavier hand fell upon his
shoulder.

"You sly dog!" said a thick voice. "Well, a judge of a good horse is a
judge of a handsome woman! We're making up a few bets on the horses
to-morrow. Colonel Ogelby will ride Dolly D, and I'm to ride my
Gladiator. It'll be a gentlemen's race."

"Aren't we gentlemen?" growled a professional turfsman.

"Gad! it's the first time I ever heard a jockey pretend to be one!"
chuckled the first speaker. "What do you say, Mauville?"

"What do I say?" repeated the land baron, striving to collect his
thoughts. "What--why, I'll make it an even thousand, if you ride your
own horse, you'll--"

"Win?" interrupted the proud owner.

"No; fall off before he's at the second quarter!"

"Done!" said the man, immediately.

"Huzza!" shouted the crowd.

"That's the way they bet on a gentlemen's race!" jeered the gleeful
jockey.

"Drinks on Gladiator!" exclaimed some one. And as no southern
gentleman was ever known to refuse to drink to a horse or a woman, the
party carried the discussion to the bar-room.

BOOK III

THE FINAL CUE

CHAPTER I

OVERLOOKING THE COURT-YARD

"In the will of the Marquis de Ligne, probated yesterday, all of the
property, real and personal, is left to his daughter, Constance,"
wrote Straws in his paper shortly after the passing of the French
nobleman. "The document states this disposition of property is made as
'an act of atonement and justice to my daughter, whose mother I
deserted, taking advantage of the French law to annul my marriage in
England.' The legitimacy of the birth of this, his only child, is
thereupon fully acknowledged by the marquis after a lapse of many
years and long after the heretofore unrecognized wife had died,
deserted and forgotten. Thrown on her own resources, the young child,
with no other friend than Manager Barnes, battled with the world; now
playing in taverns or barns, like the players of interludes, the
strollers of old, or 'vagabonds', as the great and mighty Junius, from
his lofty plane, termed them. The story of that period of 'vagrant'
life adds one more chapter to the annals of strolling players which
already include such names as Kemble, Siddons and Kean.

"From the Junius category to a public favorite of New Orleans has been
no slight transition, and now, to appear in the rôle of daughter of a
marquis and heiress to a considerable estate--truly man--and
woman--play many parts in this brief span called life! But in making
her sole heir the marquis specifies a condition which will bring
regrets to many of the admirers of the actress. He robs her of her
birthright from her mother. The will stipulates that the recipient
give up her profession, not because it is other than a noble one, but
'that she may the better devote herself to the duties of her new
position and by her beneficence and charity remove the stain left upon
an honored name by my second wife, the Duchesse D'Argens'."

The marquis' reference to "charity" and "beneficence" was in such
ill-accord with his character that it might be suspected an adroit
attorney, in drawing up the document, had surreptitiously inserted it.
His proud allusion to his honored name and slurring suggestion of the
taint put upon it by his second wife demonstrated the marquis was not
above the foibles of his kind, overlooking his own light conduct and
dwelling on that of his noble helpmate. It was the final taunt, and,
as the lady had long since been laid in God's Acre, where there is
only silence divine, it received no answer, and the world was welcome
to digest and gorge it and make the most of it.

But although the marquis and his lady had no further interest in
subsequent events, growing out of their brief sojourn on earth, the
contents of the will afforded a theme of gossip for the living and
molded the affairs of one in new shape and manner. On the same day
this public exposition appeared, Barnes and the young actress were
seated in the law office of Marks and Culver, a room overlooking a
court-yard, brightened by statues and urns of flowers. A plaster bust
of Justinian gazed benignly through the window at a fountain; a steel
engraving of Jeremy Bentham watched the butterflies, and Hobbes and
John Austin, austere in portraiture, frowned darkly down upon the
flowering garden. While the manager and Constance waited for the
attorney to appear, they were discussing, not for the first time, the
proviso of the will to which Straws had regretfully alluded.

"Yes," said Barnes, folding the newspaper which contained Straws'
article and placing it in his pocket; "you should certainly give up
the stage. We must think of the disappointments, the possible failure,
the slender reward. There was your mother--such an actress!--yet
toward the last the people flocked to a younger rival. I have often
thought anxiously of your future, for I am old--yes, there is no
denying it!--and any day I may leave you, dependent solely upon
yourself."

"Do not speak like that," she answered, tenderly. "We shall be
together many, many years."

"Always, if I had my way," he returned, heartily.

"But with this legacy you are superior to the fickle public. In fact,
you are now a part of the capricious public, my dear," he added in a
jocular tone, "and may applaud the 'heavy father,' myself, or prattle
about prevailing styles while the buskined tragedian is strutting
below your box. Why turn to a blind bargain? Fame is a jade, only
caught after our illusions are gone and she seems not half so sweet as
when pursuing her in our dreams!"

But as he spoke, with forced lightness, beneath which, however, the
young girl could readily detect the vein of anxiety and regret, she
was regarding him with the clear eyes of affection. His face, seamed
with many lines and bearing the deeply engraved handwriting of time,
spoke plainly of declining years; every lineament was eloquent with
vicissitudes endured; and as she discerningly read that varied past of
which her own brief career had been a part, there entered her mind a
brighter picture of a tranquil life for him at last, where in old age
he could exchange uncertainty and activity for security and rest. How
could she refuse to do as he desired? How often since fate had wrought
this change in her life had she asked herself the question?

Her work, it is true, had grown dearer to her than ever; of late she
had thrown herself into her task with an ardor and earnestness lifting
each portrayal to a higher plane. Is it that only with sorrow comes
the fulness of art; that its golden gates are never swung entirely
open to the soul bearing no burden?

Closed to ruder buffetings, is it only to the sesame of a sad voice
those portals spring magically back? But for his sake she must needs
pause on the threshold of attainment, and stifle that ambition which
of itself precluded consideration of a calm, uneventful existence. She
was young and full of courage, but the pathos of his years smote her
heart; something inexplicable had awakened her fears for him; she
believed him far from well of late, although he laughed at her
apprehensions and protested he had never been better in his life.

Now, reading the anxiety in his face as he watched her, she smiled
reassuringly, her glance, full of love, meeting his.

"Everything shall be as you wish," she said, softly. "You know what is
best!"

The manager's face lighted perceptibly, but before he could answer,
the door opened, and Culver, the attorney, entered. With ruddy
countenance and youthful bearing, in antithesis to the hair,
silvered with white, he was one of those southern gentlemen who grow
old gracefully. The law was his taskmaster; he practised from a sense
of duty, but ever held that those who rushed to court were likely
to repeat the experience of Voltaire, who had twice been ruined:
once when he lost a law suit; the second time, when he won one!
Nevertheless, people persisted in coming to Culver wantonly welcoming
unknown ills.

"Well, Miss Carew," he now exclaimed, after warmly greeting his
visitors, "have you disburdened yourself of prejudice against this
estate? Wealth may be a little hardship at first, but soon you won't
mind it."

"Not a bit!" spoke up Barnes. "It's as easy to get used to as--poverty,
and we've had plenty of that!"

"You know the other condition?" she said, half-defiantly, half-sadly.
"You are to be with me always."

"How can you teach an old dog new tricks?" protested Barnes. "How can
you make a fine man about town out of a 'heavy father?'"

"The 'heavy father' is my father. I never knew any other. I am glad I
never did."

"Hoity-toity!" he exclaimed scoffingly, but pleased nevertheless.

"You can't put me off that way," she said, decisively, with a sudden
flash in her eyes he knew too well to cross. "Either you leave the
stage, too, or--"

"Of course, my dear, of course--"

"Then it's all settled you will accept the encumbrance to which you
have fallen heir," resumed Culver. "Even if there had been no will in
your favor, the State of Louisiana follows the French law, and the
testator can under no circumstances alienate more than half his
property, if he leave issue or descendants. Had the old will remained,
its provisions could not have been legally carried out."

"The old will?" said Barnes. "Then there was another will?"

"One made before he was aware of your existence, Miss Carew, in favor
of his ward, Ernest Saint-Prosper."

"Ernest Saint-Prosper!"

Constance's cheeks flamed crimson, and her quick start of surprise did
not escape the observant lawyer. Barnes, too, looked amazed over this
unexpected intelligence.

"Saint-Prosper was the marquis' ward?" he cried.

The attorney transferred his gaze from the expressive features of his
fair client to the open countenance of the manager. "Yes," he said.

"And would have inherited this property but for Constance?"

"Exactly! But you knew him, Mr. Barnes?"

"He was an occupant of the chariot, sir," replied the manager, with
some feeling. "We met in the Shadengo Valley; the company was in sore
straits, and--and--to make a long story short!--he joined our band and
traversed the continent with us. And so he was the marquis' ward! It
seems almost incredible!"

"Yes," affirmed Culver; "when General Saint-Prosper, his father, died,
Ernest Saint-Prosper, who was then but a boy, became the marquis' ward
and a member of his household."

"Well, well, how things do come about!" ruminated Barnes. "To think he
should have been the prospective heir, and Constance, the real one!"

"Where is he now?" asked the attorney, thoughtfully.

"He has gone to Mexico; enlisted! But how do you know he--"

"Had expectations? The marquis told me about a quarrel they had had;
he was a staunch imperialist; the young man as firm a republican! What
would be the natural outcome? They parted in bitter anger."

"And then the marquis made him his heir?" exclaimed the manager,
incredulously. "How do you reconcile that?"

The attorney smiled. "Through the oddity of my client! 'Draw up my
will,' said the marquis to me one day, 'leaving all my property to
this republican young dog. That will cut off the distant relatives who
made the sign of the cross behind my back as though I were the evil
one. They expect it all; he expects nothing! It will be a rare joke. I
leave them my affection--and the privilege of having masses said for
my soul.' The marquis was always of a satirical temperament."

"So it seems," commented the manager. "But he changed his mind and his
will again?"

"After he met Miss Carew."

"Met me!" exclaimed Constance, aroused from a maze of reflection.

"Near the cathedral! He walked and talked with you."

"That poor old man--"

"And then came here, acknowledged you as his daughter, and drew up the
final document."

"That accounts for a call I had from him!" cried Barnes, telling the
story of the marquis' visit. "Strange, I did not suspect something of
the truth at the time," he concluded, "for his manner was certainly
unusual."

A perplexed light shone in the girl's eyes; she clasped and unclasped
her hands quickly, turning to the lawyer.

"Their quarrel was only a political difference?" she asked at length.

"Yes," said the other, slowly. "Saint-Prosper refused to support the
fugitive king. Throughout the parliamentary government, the
restoration under Louis XVIII, and the reign of King Charles X, the
marquis had ever a devout faith in the divine right of monarchs. He
annulled his marriage in England with your mother to marry the
Duchesse D'Argens, a relative of the royal princess. But Charles
abdicated and the duchesse died. All this, however, is painful to you,
Miss Carew?"

"Only such as relates to my mother," she replied in a clear tone. "I
suppose I should feel grateful for this fortune, but I am afraid I do
not. Please go on."

Culver leaned back in his chair, his glance bent upon a discolored
statue of Psyche in the court-yard. "Had the marquis attended to his
garden, like Candide, or your humble servant, and eschewed the
company of kings he might have been as care-free as he was wretched.
His monarchs were knocked down like nine-pins. Louis XVIII was a man
of straw; Charles X, a feather-top, and Louis Philippe, a toy ruler.
The marquis' domestic life was as unblest as his political career. The
frail duchesse left him a progeny of scandals. These, the only
offspring of the iniquitous dame, were piquantly dressed in the
journals for public parade. Fancy, then, his delight in disinheriting
his wife's relatives, and leaving you, his daughter, his fortune and
his name!"

"His name?" she repeated, sadly. With averted face she watched the