Meanwhile, the father died; and, suddenly, she seemed to have lost, with him, her voice, her soul and her genius.She retained just, but only just, enough of this to enter the CONSERVATOIRE, where she did not distinguish herself at all, attending the classes without enthusiasm and taking a prize only to please old Mamma Valerius, with whom she continued to live.
The first time that Raoul saw Christine at the Opera, he was charmed by the girl's beauty and by the sweet images of the past which it evoked, but was rather surprised at the negative side of her art.
He returned to listen to her.He followed her in the wings.He waited for her behind a Jacob's ladder.He tried to attract her attention.
More than once, he walked after her to the door of her box, but she did not see him.She seemed, for that matter, to see nobody.
She was all indifference.Raoul suffered, for she was very beautiful and he was shy and dared not confess his love, even to himself.
And then came the lightning-flash of the gala performance:
the heavens torn asunder and an angel's voice heard upon earth for the delight of mankind and the utter capture of his heart.
And then...and then there was that man's voice behind the door--"You must love me!"--and no one in the room....
Why did she laugh when he reminded her of the incident of the scarf?
Why did she not recognize him? And why had she written to him?...
Perros was reached at last.Raoul walked into the smoky sitting-room of the Setting Sun and at once saw Christine standing before him, smiling and showing no astonishment.
"So you have come," she said."I felt that I should find you here, when I came back from mass.Some one told me so, at the church.""Who?" asked Raoul, taking her little hand in his.
"Why, my poor father, who is dead."
There was a silence; and then Raoul asked:
"Did your father tell you that I love you, Christine, and that Ican not live without you?"
Christine blushed to the eyes and turned away her head.
In a trembling voice, she said:
"Me? You are dreaming, my friend!"
And she burst out laughing, to put herself in countenance.
"Don't laugh, Christine; I am quite serious," Raoul answered.
And she replied gravely: "I did not make you come to tell me such things as that.""You `made me come,' Christine; you knew that your letter would not leave me indignant and that I should hasten to Perros.
How can you have thought that, if you did not think I loved you?""I thought you would remember our games here, as children, in which my father so often joined.I really don't know what I thought.
...Perhaps I was wrong to write to you....This anniversary and your sudden appearance in my room at the Opera, the other evening, reminded me of the time long past and made me write to you as the little girl that I then was...."There was something in Christine's attitude that seemed to Raoul not natural.He did not feel any hostility in her; far from it:
the distressed affection shining in her eyes told him that.
But why was this affection distressed? That was what he wished to know and what was irritating him.
"When you saw me in your dressing-room, was that the first time you noticed me, Christine?"She was incapable of lying.
"No," she said, "I had seen you several times in your brother's box.
And also on the stage."
"I thought so!" said Raoul, compressing his lips."But then why, when you saw me in your room, at your feet, reminding you that Ihad rescued your scarf from the sea, why did you answer as though you did not know me and also why did you laugh?"The tone of these questions was so rough that Christine stared at Raoul without replying.The young man himself was aghast at the sudden quarrel which he had dared to raise at the very moment when he had resolved to speak words of gentleness, love and submission to Christine.A husband, a lover with all rights, would talk no differently to a wife, a mistress who had offended him.
But he had gone too far and saw no other way out of the ridiculous position than to behave odiously.
"You don't answer!" he said angrily and unhappily."Well, I will answer for you.It was because there was some one in the room who was in your way, Christine, some one that you did not wish to know that you could be interested in any one else!""If any one was in my way, my friend," Christine broke in coldly, "if any one was in my way, that evening, it was yourself, since Itold you to leave the room!"
"Yes, so that you might remain with the other!""What are you saying, monsieur?" asked the girl excitedly.
"And to what other do you refer?"
"To the man to whom you said, `I sing only for you!...to-night I gave you my soul and I am dead!'"Christine seized Raoul's arm and clutched it with a strength which no one would have suspected in so frail a creature.
"Then you were listening behind the door?""Yes, because I love you everything....And I heard everything....""You heard what?"
And the young girl, becoming strangely calm, released Raoul's arm.
"He said to you, `Christine, you must love me!'"At these words, a deathly pallor spread over Christine's face, dark rings formed round her eyes, she staggered and seemed on the point of swooning.Raoul darted forward, with arms outstretched, but Christine had overcome her passing faintness and said, in a low voice:
"Go on! Go on! Tell me all you heard!"
At an utter loss to understand, Raoul answered: "I heard him reply, when you said you had given him your soul, `Your soul is a beautiful thing, child, and I thank you.
No emperor ever received so fair a gift.The angels wept tonight.'"Christine carried her hand to her heart, a prey to indescribable emotion.Her eyes stared before her like a madwoman's.Raoul was terror-stricken.But suddenly Christine's eyes moistened and two great tears trickled, like two pearls, down her ivory cheeks.
"Christine!"
"Raoul!"
The young man tried to take her in his arms, but she escaped and fled in great disorder.
