Jeanne herself! Every nerve in me jumped. The next instant she was back in her part, railing at Georges.
I took a card from my case, and scribbled six words.
"When your daughter comes in, give her that!" I said. I had scribbled:
"I write you a star rôle!"
She gathered the message at a glance, and I swear that the moroseness of her gaze was not lightened by so much as a gleam. She was representing a character; the actress sustained the character even while she read words that were to raise her from privation to renown.
"Not that I care if I have queered her chance," she snarled. "A good job, too, the selfish cat! I've got nothing to thank her for. Serve her right if you do give her the go-by, my Jackanapes, I don't blame you!"
"Madame Laurent," Georges answered sternly, and his answer vibrated through the room, "I have never admired, pitied, or loved Jeanne so much as now that I know that she has been—motherless."
All three of us stood stone-still. The first to move was she. I saw what was going to happen. She burst out crying.
"It's I, Jeanne!—I love you! I thought I loved the theatre best—I was wrong." Instinctively she let my card fall to the ground. "Forgive me— I did it for your sake, too. It was cruel, I am ashamed. Oh, my own, if my love will not disgrace you, take me for your wife! In all the world there is no woman who will love you better—in all my heart there is no room for anything but you!"
They were in each other's arms. De Lavardens, whom the proclamation of identity had electrified, dragged me outside. The big fool was blubbering with sentiment.
"This is frightful," he grunted.