which was to come in the new year. Never in his life had he worked so hard; never in his life had he worked at all by comparison with his activities now. His fund of energy and enthusiasm was inexhaustible, like that of his good humour. He came and went, acted, wrote, conceived, directed, planned, and executed, what time M. Binet took his ease at last in comparative affluence, drank Burgundy every night, ate white bread and other delicacies, and began to congratulate himself upon his astuteness in having made this industrious, tireless fellow his partner. Having discovered how idle had been his fears of performing at Rédon, he now began to dismiss the terrors with which the notion of Nantes had haunted him.
And his happiness was reflected throughout the ranks of his company, with the single exception always of Climène. She had ceased to sneer at Scaramouche, having realized at last that her sneers left him untouched and recoiled upon herself. Thus her almost indefinable resentment of him was increased by being stifled, until, at all costs, an outlet for it must be found.
One day she threw herself in his way as he was leaving the theatre after the performance. The others had already gone, and she had returned upon pretence of having forgotten something.
"Will you tell me what I have done to you?" she asked him, point-blank.
"Done to me, mademoiselle?" He did not understand.
She made a gesture of impatience. "Why do you hate me?"
"Hate you, mademoiselle? I do not hate anybody. It is the most stupid of all the emotions. I have never hated—not even my enemies."
"What Christian resignation!"
"As for hating you, of all people! Why... I consider you adorable. I envy Léandre every day of my life. I have seriously thought of setting him to play Scaramouche, and playing lovers myself."
