"And suppose I was to keep you at your word?" asked Gontram, seriously; "suppose I came here only to demand a sacrifice of you?"
"Oh, speak!" cried the vicomte, eagerly.
"H'm, would you for my sake get on top of a stage?" asked Gontram, earnestly. "No, do not look so curiously at me. I know you never did such a thing before, and knew what I was talking about when I said I would ask a sacrifice of you."
"I—would—do it—to please you," replied Spero, hesitatingly.
"I thought so," cried the painter, laughing; "yet I made you the proposition, because I thought you were boring yourself to death here."
"But—"
"No, do not protest. You are not happy because you are the slave of propriety, and if you were to get in a stage with me it would be a heroic act on your part. If you want to go out, a carriage is at the door, the horses already harnessed. You have your own box at the theatre, and so on. Nowhere do you come in contact with the great world; your life is no life."
Spero gazed at the painter in astonishment.
"Why have you not told me all that long ago?" he slowly asked.
"Because a great deal depends on time and opportunity. If I had told you this at the commencement of our friendship you would have thought me impertinent, and I did not come here to-day either to give you a lecture. The words came unconsciously to my lips. Your life is that of a drop of oil which when put in a bottle of water feels itself in a strange element and decidedly uncomfortable."