ce that stared from
the canvas in Regnault's studio.

She had his visiting-card in her fingers. Lest he should be denied
admittance he had penciled on it, below his name, "with a message
from M. Regnault, who is very ill."

She was looking at him steadily, aware of his scrutiny.

"I will hear your message," she said. "Please sit down."

O'Neill took a chair where he could continue to see her face.

"Senora," he said, "I must tell you, first of all, that M. Regnault
is ill beyond anything you can picture to yourself. He sends this
message, in truth, from his last bed, the bed he is to die on. And
that may be at any moment. His is a disease that touches the heart;
any emotion or quick movement--anything at all, Senora, may cut off
the very source of his life. I ask you to have this in mind while you
hear me."

Her dark face was intent upon him while he spoke.

"What do you call this disease?" she asked.

"The doctors call it angina pectoris," he answered. She nodded
slowly. Her interest encouraged him to speak with more liberty.

"I could tell you a great deal about it," he went on; "but it might
be aside from the point. Still--" he pondered a moment, studying
her. "Still, imagine to yourself how such a malady sits upon a man
like Regnault. It is a fetter upon the most sluggish; for him, with
all his vivacity of temperament, his ardor, his quickness, it is a
rack upon which he is stretched. You do not know the studio he has
now, Senora! It is a great room, with walls of black panels and a
wide window in the slope of the roof. Here and there are statues in
marble, suits of armor--the wreck and debris of dead ages. And in one
corner hangs a picture which the world values, Senora. It is called
'The Dancer.'"

A spark, a quick gleam in her eyes, rewarded him. Her hands, crossed
in her lap, trembled a little.

"It is all of a dark and somber splendor," O'Neill continued. "A
great, splendid room, Senora, uncanny with echoes. And in the middle
of it, like a little white island, there is a narrow bed where he
lies through the days and nights, camping on the borders of the
grave. There are some of us that share the watches by his bedside, to
be ready with the drug that holds him to life; and I can tell you
that it is sad there, in the hush and the shadows, with the noises of
Paris rising about one from without."

He ceased. She was frowning as she listened to him, with her
resemblance to the pictured face in Paris