Sydney's heart gave one wild, pa.s.sionate throb of joy. Queenie had declared herself. She would renounce her husband! Taking the cue instantly, she sprang up and fixed a pleading gaze on the beautiful white face of the actress.

"Oh! Madame De Lisle, forgive him," she cried. "You are the living image of his first wife, whom he adored, and who died at the altar. Your perfect resemblance to her has driven him mad!"

He looked from one to the other--the dark, radiant brunette, the lily-white blonde, each so perfect in her type--and his heart sank heavily.

Had they conspired to deceive him, or was this wonderful resemblance to his lost bride but a mere coincidence--a will-o'-the-wisp, an _ignis fatuus_, to lead his heart and his reason astray?

"Cease, Sydney!" he said sternly. "She cannot deny it, she will not utter such a stupendous falsehood. My heart is too true a monitor to lead me astray! It never throbbed as it does now in the presence of any woman on earth but Queenie Lyle!"

How n.o.ble and handsome he looked as he stood there, pleading for his love with all his tender, pa.s.sionate heart shining in his dark eyes.

The actress gave one look at him, then turned away and walked to the further end of the room.

She could not bear the mute, agonizing appeal in his beautiful, troubled, dark eyes. Sydney sprang to his side and clasped her hands about his arm.

"Oh! Lawrence," she cried. "You break my heart! I tremble for your reason. Oh! pray, pray, come away from here! Madame De Lisle is very angry with you for your persistence in your strange mistake. You intrude upon her hours for study and practice. Will you not come away with me?"

He looked down at her suspiciously, without stirring from the spot.

"Sydney, if indeed I am mistaken," he said, "why are _you_ here? If this lady is not your sister, what have you to do with her? Why," he lowered his voice slightly, "why did you seek to remove her from your path?"

Sydney dropped her eyes and turned crimson.

"Oh, Lawrence," she said, "she is not my sister, but she is my rival. I know all that pa.s.sed last night, I know that she has won your heart from me."

"It was never yours, Sydney," he answered firmly. "I married you because you loved me, and were unhappy without me; but you never held my heart.

I have never loved but one woman on earth. I told you that before I made you my wife."

The listener's heart gave one great bound of joy. He loved her still--he had never loved but her. Why should she sacrifice herself and him for the doubtful good of Sydney's happiness?

A great wave of pity for herself and for her true, loyal husband swept over her heart.

She made a quick step toward him as if to throw herself upon his breast, then shrank back into herself, deterred by the agonised appeal in the eyes of Sydney, who seemed to divine her purpose.

"Oh! Lawrence," entreated Sydney, "pray go away from here. Madame De Lisle grows impatient."

The actress swept across the room, turned the handle of the door, and held it open.

"Mrs. Ernscliffe is right," she said in a cold, hard tone, "I am both weary and impatient. I can bear no more. This trespa.s.s on my time and patience is inexcusable. Will it please you to go now, sir?"

Lawrence Ernscliffe advanced and stood before her in the doorway. She could not bear the pa.s.sionate pain and reproach in the beautiful eyes he fastened on her face. Her gaze wavered and fell before his.

"Queenie," he said, slowly and sadly, "you have not deceived me! You cannot deny that you are my own! Your soul is too white and pure to suffer such a falsehood to stain your lips! Yet you will not let me claim you, you are sacrificing your happiness and mine for a mere chimera! I understand it all. Sydney has asked for the sacrifice and you have made it. It is for _her sake_!"

He bent down, lifted a spray of white hyacinth that had fallen from the lace on her breast to the floor, pressed it to his lips, and silently withdrew.

Queenie closed the door upon his retreating form and turned back to her sister.

"He was right," she said slowly, "I have sacrificed my happiness and his for your sake, Sydney."

Sydney lifted her heavy eyes and looked at her without speaking. Queenie went on slowly: "This is my revenge, Sydney: you have scorned and insulted me, you have branded me with a cruel name, you have tried to poison me--me, the little sister you loved and petted when we were children at our mother's knee! Yet, for the sake of those old days, and the love we had for each other then, I forgive you--nay, more, I make the sacrifice you were cruel enough to ask of me. I resign the one being whom I have sought for years--the one thing dear to me upon earth. I give you the pulse of my heart, the life of my life, the soul of my soul!"

Cold and white as marble in her sublime self-abnegation, she pointed to the door.

"Go," she said, "I can bear no more!"

Sydney obeyed her without a word.

Then the beautiful queen of tragedy, the lovely woman who counted her admirers by the hundreds, knelt down upon the floor, and lifted her white, despairing face to Heaven.

"Oh! G.o.d," she moaned, "If indeed I am a sinner, as she said, surely this great and bitter sacrifice for another's sake must win for me the pity and pardon of Heaven!"

CHAPTER XXIX.

The three weeks of La Reine Blanche's London engagement were drawing to a close.

She had achieved a brilliant success. Her beauty and her genius were the themes of every tongue.

Her admirers were legion. She had a score of wealthy and t.i.tled lovers.

It was even said that a n.o.ble and well-known duke had proposed to marry her, and met with a cold and haughty refusal.

The managers of the theater where she was playing tried to secure her for another month. It would be worth a fortune to them, they said, and they allowed her to make her own terms.

To their consternation she utterly declined a longer engagement and announced her intention to retire from the stage.

The managers were astounded. What! retire from the stage in the zenith of her fame, with all her gifts of youth, beauty and genius. It was too dreadful. Yet in spite of their remonstrances she persevered. She canceled at a tremendous cost an engagement she had made with a Parisian manager. A whisper was circulated and began to gain credence that the beautiful _tragedienne_ was about to enter a convent and take the veil for life.

She did not deny it when people questioned her, but she would not tell the reason why she was about to take such a strange step.

She only smiled sadly when they remonstrated with her, but she would never tell why she was about to immure herself, with all her gifts of beauty, youth and genius, in a living tomb.

But there was one thing that was palpable to all who saw her off the stage and divested of the trickery of paint and cosmetics. La Reine Blanche was fading like the frailest summer flower. The lily bloomed on her cheek instead of the rose.

Under her large, blue eyes lay purple shadows, darker and deeper than those cast by the drooping lashes. A look of patient suffering crept about the corners of her lips and hid in her eyes. Her smiles were sadder and more pathetic than sighs, her form grew slighter and more ethereal in its perfect grace, her step lost its lightness and elasticity. Some said that the beautiful actress was dying of a broken heart, others said that she was falling into a consumption.

She heard these things and made no outward sign, but inwardly she said to herself:

"They are both right and wrong. I am dying because I have nothing left to live for. I have toiled and hoped for years. I have studied and practiced to get money to carry me over the wide world in search of the one true heart that was mine only, and now that I have found it I have had to give it away. I cannot endure it; I am not strong enough. There is nothing left me but to die!"

She thought of some sorrowful lines she had somewhere read and mournfully repeated them:

"Much must be borne which is hard to bear, Much given away which it were sweet to keep.

G.o.d helps us all! who need indeed His care; And yet I know the Shepherd loves His sheep."

Those flying rumors and reports only served to make Madame De Lisle more popular. She was the rage. She played to densely packed houses every night.