ch her after that? And could he
ever get her to love him? Ah, perhaps it would have been better if he had
gone and broken his neck in the street, on the pavement! Jimmy was
trembling like a child; in his perturbation, he even forgot to knock at
the door ... turned the knob ... entered....

Lily heard nothing, seemed crushed into her chair, with her face buried in
her right arm folded on the table, while the left hung lifeless by her
side. Her whole attitude expressed abject misery, profound despair; she
seemed extinguished in a terrifying calmness.

Jimmy, to attract her attention, closed the door noisily. Lily stirred no
more than a wax figure: one might have thought her dead.

He shivered; and, stepping forward, leaning over to her, anxiously, he
placed his hand on her shoulder.

It was like a spring that is suddenly released! Lily threw up her
sorrow-stricken face, down which the tears, mingling with the red paint,
flowed like blood, looked at him for a few seconds with a wandering air
and then leaped at him, as though she meant to bite him in the face; but
her lips shriveled up in silence, nothing came from them; and she crushed
Jimmy with an unspeakable look of terror and contempt.

Jimmy did not flinch:

"You must not be angry with me," he said gently. "I was bound to do it,
Lily; I had to save the theater."

"And get rid of me!" cried Lily, wild-haired, hard-eyed, hoarse-throated,
with the tears drying on her red-hot cheeks.

Jimmy was pale as death. Ah, all his dreams, too, were fading away!

"Lily," he said, in a voice which he strove to make firm, but which
trembled with emotion. "I have done my duty to everybody, yourself
included! But for me, you would be lying dead at this minute and the
Astrarium would be ruined. You were not in a state to appear in public ...
this evening ... believe me, Lily. The stage-manager himself...."

Lily lowered her head under his calm gaze....

"But you'll do it to-morrow," continued Jimmy, very quickly, "before Pa
and Ma! To-morrow and the following days ... and always! Your name will be
right at the top of the bill! Do you hear? To-morrow ... and always!"

"But what...? Why...?" asked Lily, as though stupefied.

"Poor Lily," he replied, gently raising that face all distorted with
grief. "Poor little Lily! I have caused you a heap of pain."

Lily, for her sole answer, gave a convulsive sob; a tear leaped to her
eyelids.

"Don't cry," whispered Jimmy, "don't cry