"Yes."

"By all means tell me what it is."

"_Mon Dieu!_" said Gillier. "What is the good of a cloud of words between two men? I want to buy back the libretto I sold to you more than a year ago."

Charmian gazed at her husband. To her surprise his usually sensitive face did not show her what was pa.s.sing in his mind. Indeed she thought it looked peculiarly inexpressive as he replied:

"Do you? Why?"

"Why? Because I don't think you and I are suited to work together. I don't think we could ever make a satisfactory combination in art. This has been my opinion ever since I was with you at Constantine."

"More than a year ago. And you only come here and say so now!"

Gillier was silent and fidgeted on the divan.

"Surely you must have some other reason?" said Claude in a very quiet, almost unnaturally quiet voice.

"That is one reason, and an excellent one. Another is, however, that if you will consent to sell me back my libretto I believe I could get it taken up by a man, a composer, who is more in sympathy with me and my artistic aims than you could ever be."

"I see. And what about all the months of work I have put in? What about all the music I have composed? Are you here to ask me to throw it away, or what?"

Gillier was silent.

"Surely your proposition isn't a serious one?" said Claude, still speaking with complete self-control.

"But I say it is! I say"--Gillier raised his voice--"that it is serious.

I am a poor man, and I am sick of waiting for success. I sold my libretto to you in a hurry, not knowing what I was doing. Now I have a chance, a great chance, of being a.s.sociated with someone who is already famous, who would make the success of my libretto a certainty--"

"A chance, when your libretto is my property!" interrupted Claude.

"Oh, I know as well as you do that it's a hard thing to ask you to throw away all these months of labor! I don't think I could have done it, though in this world every man, every artist especially, must think of himself, if it wasn't for one thing."

"And that is--?"

"Your heart isn't in the work!" said Gillier defiantly, but with a curious air of conviction--the conviction of an acute man who had made a discovery which could not be contested or gainsaid.

"That's not true, Monsieur Gillier!" said Charmian, with hot energy.

Claude said nothing, and Gillier continued, raising his voice:

"It is true. Your talent and mine are not fitted to be joined together, and you are artist enough to know it as well as I do. I haven't heard your music; but I can tell. I may be poor, I may be unknown--that doesn't matter! I've got the instinct that doesn't lie, can't lie. If I had known you as I do now, before I had sold my libretto, you never should have had it, even if you had offered me five hundred pounds instead of a hundred, and n.o.body else would have looked at it. With your temperament, with your way of thinking, you'll never make a success of it--never! I tell you that--I who am speaking to you!"

The veins in his temples swelled, and he frowned.

"Give me back my libretto and take back your money! Let me have my chance of success. Madame--she is hard! She cares nothing! But--"

"Monsieur, I must ask you to leave my wife's name out," said Claude.

And for the first time since he had come into the room he spoke with stern determination.

He had become very pale, and now looked strangely moved.

"I won't have her name brought in," he added. "This is my affair."

"Very well! Will you let me buy back my libretto?"

Charmian expected an instant stern refusal from her husband. But after Gillier's question there was a prolonged pause. She wanted to break it, to answer fiercely for Claude; but she did not dare to. For a moment something in her husband's look and manner dominated her. For a moment she was in subjection. She sat still staring at Claude, waiting for him to speak. He sat looking down, and it seemed to her as if he were wrestling as Jacob wrestled with the angel. His white forehead drew her eyes. She was filled with fear; but when he looked up at her the fear grew. She felt almost sick--sick with apprehension.

"Claude!" she said. "Oh, Claude!"

It seemed that his eyes had put a great question to her, and now her voice had answered it.

Claude turned to Armand Gillier.

"Monsieur," he said, "you can't have your libretto back. It's mine, and I'm going to keep it."

When Gillier was gone Charmian said, almost in a faltering voice, and with none of her usual self-possession of manner:

"How--how could you bear that man's insults as you did?"

"His insults?"

"Yes."

Claude looked at her in silence. And again she was conscious of fear.

"Don't let us ever speak of this again," he answered at last.

He went away.

That day he was in his workroom till very late. He did not come to tea.

The evening fell; but he was not working on the opera. Charmian heard him playing Bach.

At the end of April Alston Lake came once more to visit them.

Since those London days when they had first met him Lake had made great progress toward the fulfilment of his ambition. His energy and will were beginning to reap a good reward. He was making money, enough money to live upon; but he had still to pay back his big debt to Jacob Crayford, had still to achieve his great desire, an appearance in Grand Opera.

When he arrived at Djenan-el-Maqui he brought with him, as of old, an infectious atmosphere of enthusiasm. With his iron will he combined a light heart. He had none of the childishness that surprised, and sometimes charmed, in Jacques Sennier, but much that was boyish still pleasantly lingered with him. In him, too, there was something courageous that inspired courage in others.

This time he announced he could stay for a month if they did not mind.

He wanted a thorough rest before the many concerts he was going to sing at during the London season. Both Charmian and Claude were delighted.

When Claude heard of it he was silent for a moment. Then he began to reckon.

"The thirtieth to-day, isn't it? By a month do you mean a month or four weeks?"

"Well, four weeks, old chap!"

"That is less than a month."