is
there anything in my young friend?"

"Nothing I can see. She's loud and coarse."

"She's very much afraid. You must allow for that."

"Afraid of me, immensely, but not a bit afraid of her authors--nor of
you!" Madame Carre smiled.

"Aren't you prejudiced by what that fellow Nash has told you?"

"Why prejudiced? He only told me she was very handsome."

"And don't you think her so?"

"Admirable. But I'm not a photographer nor a dressmaker nor a coiffeur.
I can't do anything with 'back hair' nor with a mere big stare."

"The head's very noble," said Peter Sherringham. "And the voice, when
she spoke English, had some sweet tones."

"Ah your English--possibly! All I can say is that I listened to her
conscientiously, and I didn't perceive in what she did a single
_nuance_, a single inflexion or intention. But not one, _mon cher_. I
don't think she's intelligent."

"But don't they often seem stupid at first?"

"Say always!"

"Then don't some succeed--even when they're handsome?"

"When they're handsome they always succeed--in one way or another."

"You don't understand us English," said Peter Sherringham.

Madame Carre drank her tea; then she replied: "Marry her, my son, and
give her diamonds. Make her an ambassadress; she'll look very well."

"She interests you so little that you don't care to do anything for
her?"

"To do anything?"

"To give her a few lessons."

The old actress looked at him a moment; after which, rising from her
place near the table on which the tea had been served, she said to
Miriam Rooth: "My dear child, I give my voice for the _scene anglaise_.
You did the English things best."

"Did I do them well?" asked the girl.

"You've a great deal to learn; but you've rude force. The main things
_sont encore a degager_, but they'll come. You must work."

"I think she has ideas," said Mrs. Rooth.

"She gets them from you," Madame Carre replied.

"I must say that if it's to be _our_ theatre I'm relieved. I do think
ours safer," the good lady continued.

"Ours is dangerous, no doubt."

"You mean you're more severe," said the girl.

"Your mother's right," the actress smiled; "you have ideas."

"But what shall we do then--how shall we proceed?" Mrs. Rooth made this
appeal, plaintively and vaguely, to the three gentlemen; but they had
collected a few steps off and were so occupied in talk that it failed to
reach them.

"Work--work--work!" exclaimed the actress.

"In English I