Her lashes veiled the azure orbs.
“You think to disarm her with a compliment? How well you understand women!” And, as he rose, the pressure of the hand she gave him at parting was lingering.
Above in his room, Barnes, with plays and manuscripts scattered around him, was engaged in writing in his note and date book, wherein autobiography, ledger and journal accounts, and such miscellaneous matter mingled indiscriminately. “To-day she said to me: ‘I am going to the races with Mr. Saint-Prosper.’ What did I say? ‘Yes,’ of course. What can there be in common between Lear and Juliet? Naturally, she sometimes turns from an old fellow like me––now, if she were only a slip of a girl again––with her short frock––her disorder of long ringlets––running and romping––
“A thousand details pass through my mind, reminiscences of her girlhood, lightening a lonesome life like glimmerings of sunshine in a secluded wood; memories of her mother and the old days when she played in my New York theater––for Barnes, the stroller, was once a metropolitan manager! Her fame had preceded her and every admirer of histrionic art eagerly awaited her arrival.
“But the temple of art is a lottery. The town that had welcomed her so wildly now went Elssler-mad. The gossamer floatings of this French danseuse possessed 258 everyone. People courted trash and trumpery. Greatness gave way to triviality. This pitiful condition preyed upon her. The flame of genius never for a moment became less dim, but her eyes grew larger, brighter, more melancholy. Sometimes she would fall into a painful reverie and I knew too well the subject of her thoughts. With tender solicitude she would regard her daughter, thinking, thinking! She was her only hope, her only joy!
“‘The town wants dancers, not tragedians, Mr. Barnes,’ she said sadly one day.
“‘Nonsense,’ I replied. ‘The town wants a change of bill. We will put on a new piece next week.’
“‘It will be but substituting one tragedy for another,’ she retorted. ‘One misfortune for a different one! You should import a rival dancer. You are going down; down hill! I will leave you; perhaps you will discover your dancer, and your fortune is made!’