“I see a vision. It is a battlefield. Many are dying. A great officer is wounded. He falls. He is a father. She, his child, comes to him. It is a girl, a young woman. She bends over him. I see her face. Now I do not see it. But yes. It is Marie. No, it is little Jeanne. No! No! It is one. Which is it? My God, the vision is gone!” She falls to the earth in a spasm. When she comes to herself, the two girls implore her to tell them the truth. Had she seen one? Had it been the other? For both Marie and Petite Jeanne had been brought up like orphans in the gypsy camp. It had been rumored that one of these was stolen as a babe from a great French family. But which? No one knew.
Such is the story of that drama up to the great third act in which Petite Jeanne was to emerge from her obscurity and play an important role.
One fact we have not mentioned. Early in this play, it is revealed that Petite Jeanne’s gypsy lover has gone to war, and is believed to have been killed.
All during the first act, and again through the second, Jeanne’s eyes strayed to one spot, to the seats that had been allotted to Florence and any friend she might care to bring. Always the seats were unoccupied. At each fresh disappointment her despair deepened.
“Will they not come?” she asked herself over and over. “They must! They must!”
CHAPTER XXXII
PETITE JEANNE’S TRIUMPH
The tale the gypsy woman had to tell was as astonishing as it was fascinating. As we have said, told in her halting speech, it was long. Florence’s face showed her consternation as she looked at her watch when it was done.
“Come!” she cried, seizing the woman’s arm. “We must go to the theatre at once! We will miss some. We must not miss all. It is the first big night.”
She started and all but screamed as a man loomed before her. The officer! She had quite forgotten him.
“No tricks!” he warned. “She must start for Canada to-night.”