gun his work; and at
this perilous time in my career, just as I had quarrelled with my
manager, Maxime Dalahaide fell in love with me. I thought he was rich.
It occurred to me that if I became his wife I could leave the stage in a
blaze of glory. Besides, he was brilliant and handsome. I was flattered
by his admiration, and felt that it would be easy to love him. I did all
I could to win an offer of marriage from him. When it came I accepted.
But soon after our engagement his father lost a great deal of money. I
realized that Maxime would not be as good a match as I had counted upon
making. Still, I did not throw him over; for by that time I cared for his
handsome face, and I was of far too jealous a nature to risk throwing him
into the arms of another woman. If we parted, I thought I knew to what
woman he would turn. There was an English girl singing at the Opera
Comique, whose name at one time had been coupled with Maxime Dalahaide's.
She had a good voice and a pretty enough face, but she would not have
succeeded in Paris, people whispered, if Maxime had not helped her. I had
spoken to him of this girl, and he had denied caring for her. She was a
very ordinary, uninteresting creature, apart from her beauty, he said;
but she had been friendless and in hard luck, and as he was half English
himself, he had done what he could to aid a lonely and deserving young
countrywoman, that was all. Still, I was never sure that he was not
deceiving me. Altogether, in those days, I was unhappy. The Marchese
Loria, Maxime's best friend--as I thought--was very sympathetic. He came
often to see me, both with Maxime and alone. One day they quarrelled in
my house. It was Loria who began it. He accused Maxime of prejudicing his
sister Madeleine against him, and Maxime admitted that, though he loved
Loria, he did not think he would made a good husband, and did not wish
him to marry Madeleine. With a look of jealous hatred in his eyes, which
I have never forgotten, Loria cried out that Maxime had always taken away
from him everything he wanted most--love of friends and women,
popularity, all that a man values in life. Then, almost before Maxime
could answer to vow that never, consciously, had he been Loria's rival or
injured him in any way, Loria begged forgiveness, said he had spoken in
anger--that in his heart he did not mean a word. So the quarrel--if
quarrel you could call it--was made up. But I guessed then that Loria had
never really lov