“And now, Miss Jeanne.” Soloman drew a paper from his pocket. “Here is a contract for you. We have made you—no, no, you have made yourself—a star; and of course you will make another picture; many, many more.”
“Please,” Jeanne pressed the paper back into his hand, “not to-night. My head is in a whirl. Perhaps never at all, but surely not to-night.”
“To-morrow then. I can wait.” The great little man folded his paper neatly and thrust it deep in his pocket.
“This moving picture,” said Jeanne, still feeling that she must make a speech. “It is beautiful. I have seen. You have seen. It is truly beautiful. But it is not I who have made it. It is you, my friends, Mr. Soloman, Pietro, Anthony, Scott Ramsey and all the rest. It is the spirit of those so beautiful mountains. It is the soul of that so great American, Mr. Lincoln. It is every one. It is everything. It is not I.
“And now,” she murmured after the applause had died away, “I am very tired. Will you please take me home, not to that so grand hotel but to the little rooms where my good Florence and I have lived so happily. No longer am I Lorena LeMar. I am only Petite Jeanne, the gypsy.”
Once more they bore her in triumph on their shoulders, and tucked her away at last in the taxi between Florence and Jensie, while Erik Nord and Tom Tobin took their places on the drop seats before her.
There was little left to be told. It was told in the shabby third floor rooms that were the private castle of Florence and Jeanne. With Tom as her bodyguard Jeanne hurried to the little hotel where she presented her check and received in exchange her well filled laundry bag.
When Tom had carried this to the top floor room, she bade him pour its contents on the floor.
“Behold the bell, the banners!” she exclaimed. “I have had them hidden away all the time. Do not ask me why. I am a gypsy. A gypsy needs no reason.
“And now, Mr. Nord, with my good friend’s permission, I return them to you. Florence has told me of the cute Chinese children. May they all get well speedily.”