"Clémence complain! She would not complain if she suffered martyrdom." Madame Regnault looked imploringly at her mother, but she went on more sternly than before: "If Clémence had a spark of spirit she would never have had Léonie in the house. It is a shame for her to be made a slave to the opera-singer's girl, and I am not the only one who thinks so."
"Pardon me, madame," responded her son-in-law, "the conversation is too exciting for me. I have the honor to wish you a good-morning;" and he bowed himself out with the most exasperating courtesy.
"Oh, mother, what have you done?" cried Madame Regnault, trembling and tearful. "How could you make him so angry?"
"How could I, indeed! I wish I were his wife a little while: he wouldn't find it so easy to tyrannize over me. I don't know where you got your disposition from: you didn't take it from me, that's certain."
"Jacques," said Colonel Regnault to the porter as he left the house, "when Madame Dumesnil calls to see your mistress hereafter, let me know it, and remember that I am never at home."
Léonie, though she felt a certain hardness in the manner of Madame Dumesnil when she happened to meet her, was wholly unaware of what was passing in the heart of Madame Regnault, who had a genuine sympathetic interest in the development of her remarkable powers, playing her accompaniments unweariedly for hours daily and giving her the benefit of her own delicate and highly-cultivated taste. They were happy years for Léonie. Her young soul, full of the inspiration and power of genius, felt its wings growing. There is an atmosphere of art in Paris which is powerfully stimulating to any one of æsthetic tendencies; and how exhilarating was this subtle atmosphere to Léonie! The Conservatoire, with its seventy professors and its thousand students, its competitions, concerts and public exercises, stimulated her zeal and inspired ever higher ideals that made close, hard study the play of her fresh and delighted faculties. Once a week her father took her to the opera. It happened that the first opera she heard was Faust, and she sat as if in a dream, white and scared, seeming to see in the scenes the spectre of her mother. But this impression wore away, and ere many weeks had passed her heart dilated, her eyes kindled with the triumphs of the singer, and she felt as Correggio when he looked on Raphael's St. Cecilia and exclaimed, "I, too, am a painter!"
Thus the days went on, not too slowly, till Léonie had entered her nineteenth year and approached the close of her studies. The finest concerts of Paris and the most exclusive are those of the Conservatoire, six in number, which occur once a fortnight from the middle of January to the middle of April. Léonie had often sung in the small concert-hall at examinations and private exercises, but now she was to sing in the Salle de Spectacle for the celebrated Société des Concerts. This wonderful company is composed mostly of the professors and teachers at the Conservatoire, and it is a rare honor for a pupil to sing or play at these concerts; but Léonie was a rare pupil, and whatever may be said of the jealousy of artists, I hold that true genius always exults in the recognition of genius. Léonie sang in each of the six concerts of her last year at the Conservatoire, and her singing gave exquisite delight to the appreciative listeners: the applause was heart-felt, enthusiastic, inspiring. But on the last night her father's rapture and pride reached their height. The beautiful concert-hall, so refined and classic with its Pompeii-like decorations, was filled with the most brilliant audience of a most brilliant city. The symphony had ended, and Léonie was to sing some selections from the opera of Fidelio. The applause which greeted her as she advanced on the stage was perhaps a tribute to her superb beauty and perfect grace. She was paler than usual, her large black eyes were full of that intense light which only emotion gives, but she showed no embarrassment, and felt none. She saw not the faces, heard not the plaudits. She was alone with her art. Her soul went forth into the song, and one listened in rapture, touched with pain that aught so sweet should be so evanescent. When the wonderful voice seemed to die like a vanishing soul there was silence for a moment—silence most eloquent of eulogies—and then came a burst of applause, the most enthusiastic that ever relieved a listener's heart or charmed a singer's ear.
The concert ended. Her father, proud and exultant, clasped her in his arms. Did he hear the whispers that Léonie's quick ear caught? "Colonel Regnault's daughter, the opera-singer's child. You remember that old story?"—"Ah, indeed! Wonderfully like her mother: more distinguished manner. Something of her father too. Will Regnault let her go on the stage, do you think?"—"I cannot tell. Il est fou d'elle. He brings her up in his own family."—"Vraiment? Good wife, Madame Regnault." Léonie shrank involuntarily from her father's embrace.
The competitive examinations came, and naturally Léonie received the highest prize in singing.
"I do not envy you, mademoiselle," said one of the unsuccessful candidates with a look and tone that accentuated the sneer: "there are other things that people inherit besides their musical talents."