LIONNETTE.

What good would it have done?

JOHN.

Have you claimed that amount from her?

LIONNETTE.

Certainly. She denied it.

JOHN (_to_ RICHARD).

You might follow it up.

RICHARD.

No; it is trust-money. The law does not recognize it, and besides....

LIONNETTE.

I have only my word to support what I say. Madame de Spadetta replied to me that what my father had left her was in remuneration for services that her husband and she had rendered my father for thirty years. The truth is, that out of these two millions there were five hundred thousand francs for what she calls her services, and fifteen hundred thousand francs for me. It is for that that I turned her out of doors.

RICHARD.

Knowing that I have the care of your affairs, she came to find me out....

LIONNETTE.

To....

RICHARD.

To offer you five hundred thousand francs.

LIONNETTE.

On the part of whom? for she is a person equal to any kind of emba.s.sy.

RICHARD.

On the part of your father's family.

LIONNETTE.

What does she demand in return?...

RICHARD.

The giving up....

LIONNETTE.

Of all my father's letters.

RICHARD.

Yes; you knew it?

LIONNETTE.

I suspected it, from a few words she said to me. I refuse to do so.

RICHARD.

Your mother, before she died, handed over, for a much less important amount, all the letters that she also possessed from your father.

LIONNETTE.

My mother did as she pleased; I, too, shall do as I please; and, as my mother is dead, I refrain from saying all I think.

RICHARD.

Why do you care so much about those letters?

LIONNETTE.

You ask me that, Mr. Richard? Why do I care so much for the letters of a father whom I loved, who loved me, the man who was my father, and who is dead?

RICHARD.

What do you intend to do with them?

LIONNETTE.

To keep them, to read them over again, as I do now from time to time, when the living trouble or disgust me; and when I die, carry them with me and give them back to him--to him--if it be true that one meets again in death those one has loved in life. Who knows? Perhaps, after being so powerful on earth, he will have no one but me in heaven. So I must keep something by which he may know me--up there--since he was not able to recognize me here below.

JOHN (_to_ RICHARD).

How can one help worshipping that woman? (_He takes her head between his hands and kisses her hair._) There.

RICHARD (_taking the hand of_ LIONNETTE).

The fact is that she has the blood of a good race in her, and that they named you very appropriately, calling you Lionnette--little lioness; but unfortunately it is not with that that creditors are paid, and I offer you the only way which is open to you.

LIONNETTE.

G.o.d has. .h.i.therto given, G.o.d will give again; if He forget us, then chance must take us.