ries silenced Camusot with repeated cries of "Hush!"
The galleries even silenced the _claqueurs_ when they led off with
exaggerated salvos. Martainville applauded bravely; Nathan, Merlin, and
the treacherous Florine followed his example; but it was clear that the
piece was a failure. A crowd gathered in Coralie's dressing-room and
consoled her, till she had no courage left. She went home in despair,
less for her own sake than for Lucien's.

"Braulard has betrayed us," Lucien said.

Coralie was heartstricken. The next day found her in a high fever,
utterly unfit to play, face to face with the thought that she had been
cut short in her career. Lucien hid the papers from her, and looked
them over in the dining-room. The reviewers one and all attributed the
failure of the piece to Coralie; she had overestimated her strength;
she might be the delight of a boulevard audience, but she was out of her
element at the Gymnase; she had been inspired by a laudable ambition,
but she had not taken her powers into account; she had chosen a part
to which she was quite unequal. Lucien read on through a pile of
penny-a-lining, put together on the same system as his attack upon
Nathan. Milo of Crotona, when he found his hands fast in the oak which
he himself had cleft, was not more furious than Lucien. He grew haggard
with rage. His friends gave Coralie the most treacherous advice, in
the language of kindly counsel and friendly interest. She should
play (according to these authorities) all kind of roles, which the
treacherous writers of these unblushing _feuilletons_ knew to be utterly
unsuited to her genius. And these were the Royalist papers, led off by
Nathan. As for the Liberal press, all the weapons which Lucien had used
were now turned against him.

Coralie heard a sob, followed by another and another. She sprang out of
bed to find Lucien, and saw the papers. Nothing would satisfy her but
she must read them all; and when she had read them, she went back to
bed, and lay there in silence.

Florine was in the plot; she had foreseen the outcome; she had studied
Coralie's part, and was ready to take her place. The management,
unwilling to give up the piece, was ready to take Florine in Coralie's
stead. When the manager came, he found poor Coralie sobbing and
exhausted on her bed; but when he began to say, in Lucien's presence,
that Florine knew the part, and that the play must be given that
evening, Coralie sprang up at once.

"I wi