"Poor McAllister! What with you and M. Bois-le-Duc, he is not a very enviable person."
"Then you are sorry for him?"
"Pardon me, I am not. I have only one feeling towards him, and that would be wiser to keep to myself. Marie, long ago, at Father Point, I saw it all, though you imagined I was so taken up with my painting and my own affairs. I knew McAllister was wholly unworthy of the respect and affection you and M. Bois-le-Duc lavished on him.
"I knew him better than either of you, his weakness, his indecision; but it was not for me to warn you, how could I? Then, Marie, changes came to all of us. McAllister came into his inheritance; you went to seek your fortune; I to work hard in a merchant's office in Montreal. For four years, I labored there at most uncongenial work, but I managed to scrape enough together to pay for my course of study at the school of one of the best masters in Paris. These years of drudgery in Montreal and Paris were only brightened by one hope—a hope I scarcely dared acknowledge to myself, so vain did it appear."
"Yes," said Marie. "But you have succeeded, and your hope has been realized."
"It has not been realized; it is as far from realization as ever."
"I am astonished to hear you speak in such a way after your brilliant success of yesterday."
"Yes, success is satisfactory, and it is a means to an end in this case. Marie, my dear one, through all those long years of drudgery I heard of you only through M. Bois-le-Duc at rare intervals. But, through all that weary time, I never ceased to think of you, though as one far, far removed from me. Then you rose to fame and wealth; to me, a poor struggling artist, further off than ever, and for a time I despaired. You were fêted by the highest in the land, all London was at your feet—what had I to do with the brilliant prima donna? What claim had I to remind her of the old days at Father Point, of my life-long devotion? Oh! Marie, my darling, to keep silence, to think that I might lose you after all, was almost unendurable. Now, though, I can speak. I, too, have achieved success as the world counts it. We may now, on that score, meet as equals. Were it not so, I should keep silence always. Marie, I have loved you ever since I knew you. I have watched with interest your whole career, your failures, your successes. I dare not hope my affection is returned—that is too much—and I must ask pardon for having spoken to you to-day."
The self-possessed prima donna had been very still while Lacroix spoke, and sat shading her face with one hand, and, strange to say, endeavoring to hide the tears which would come in spite of her efforts.
"Marie, speak, my dear one. Have I distressed you? Oh! Marie, I should not have spoken, only the thought of putting the Atlantic between us without telling you was too hard, Marie."