One morning, about a month after his visit to Versailles, Eusebe, with an enormous bouquet in his hand, entered the boudoir of AdÉonne.

“Why do you bring these flowers?” inquired the comÉdienne. “This is not my birthday, if I remember rightly.”

“No,” responded the young man: “it is only the birthday of the bouquet.”

“It is one of those days on which both flowers and compliments are of bad augury. I will wager that these camellias conceal some bad news.”

“That is true.”

“The nature of it?”

“I hardly know how to inform you.”

“You are about to be married: is it not so?”

“Yes. Who could have told you?”

“I have known it for more than two weeks. I found a letter from your father in the pocket of your coat. You need not attempt to excuse yourself. I know all you could say.”

“I shall not attempt to justify myself,” replied Eusebe, affecting a tranquillity of mind which he was far from possessing. “I take a wife because a man must discharge the duties he owes to society.”

“You see, my dear Eusebe,” continued the actress, “we are thought to be hardened, to have no heart,—we women of the theatre. Nothing could be further from the truth. I loved you because I thought you a man of sense and of courage. How grossly I was deceived! You are a fool and a coward!”

“AdÉonne!”

“Do not become excited: you see that I am perfectly calm. I repeat that you are both a fool and a coward. The first duty of a man is to live for the woman whom he loves and who loves him. The characteristic of a man of intelligence is to prefer that happiness he knows to that which is untried. Of what importance is it to me that you are going to be married, since you love me no longer? I should only ask time to avenge myself, if I did not love you still. It is a great misfortune for me; for my love will kill me, if I cannot succeed in crushing it, which would be little better than death itself.”

“Do you desire me to break off this marriage?” demanded Eusebe. “There is yet time.”

“No, Eusebe. If you were to revoke your promise, I could not recall my illusions.”