"Stark, staring mad. You bewail that you are at the foot of the ladder, and at the same instant you stipulate that I shall lift you at a bound to the top. Either you are a lunatic, or you are an amateur."
She, too, rose—resigned to her dismissal, it seemed. Then, suddenly, with a gesture that was a veritable abandonment of despair, she laughed.
"That's it, I am an amateur!" she rejoined passionately. "I will tell you the kind of 'amateur' I am, monsieur de Varenne! I was learning my business in a fit-up when I was six years old—yes, I was playing parts on the road when happier children were playing games in nurseries. I was thrust on for lead when I was a gawk of fifteen, and had to wrestle with half a dozen roles in a week, and was beaten if I failed to make my points. I have supered to stars, not to earn the few francs I got by it, for by that time the fit-ups paid me better, but that I might observe, and improve my method. I have waited in the rain, for hours, at the doors of the milliners and modistes, that I might note how great ladies stepped from their carriages and spoke to their footmen—and when I snatched a lesson from their aristocratic tones I was in heaven, though my feet ached and the rain soaked my wretched clothes. I have played good women and bad women, beggars and queens, ingénues and hags. I was born and bred on the stage, have suffered and starved on it. It is my life and my destiny." She sobbed. "An 'amateur'!"
I could not let her go like that. She interested me strongly; somehow I believed in her. I strode to and fro, considering.
"Sit down again," I said. "I will do this for you: I will go to the country to see your performance. When is your next show?"
"I have nothing in view."
"Bigre! Well, the next time you are playing, write to me."
"You will have forgotten all about me," she urged feverishly, "or your interest will have faded, or Fate will prevent your coming."
"Why do you say so?"
"Something tells me. You will help me now, or you will never help me— my chance is to-day! Monsieur, I entreat you—"