Then suddenly: “What is she doing?” he asked. “Do you ever see her?” “She is playing in--” I mentioned the name of a comic opera then running in Paris. “No; I have not seen her for some time.” He laid his white, wasted hand on mine. “What a pity you and I could not have rolled ourselves into one, Paul--you, the saint, and I, the satyr. Together we should have made her perfect lover.” There came back to me the memory of those long nights when I had lain awake listening to the angry voices of my father and mother soaking through the flimsy wall. It seemed my fate to stand thus helpless between those I loved, watching them hurting one another against their will. “Tell me,” I asked--“I loved her, knowing her: I was not blind. Whose fault was it? Yours or hers?” He laughed. “Whose fault, Paul? God made us.” Thinking of her fair, sweet face, I hated him for his mocking laugh. But the next moment, looking into his deep eyes, seeing the pain that dwelt there, my pity was for him. A smile came to his ugly mouth. “You have been on the stage, Paul; you must have heard the saying often: 'Ah, well, the curtain must come down, however badly things are going.' It is only a play, Paul. We do not choose our parts. I did not even know I was the villain, till I heard the booing of the gallery. I even thought I was the hero, full of noble sentiment, sacrificing myself for the happiness of the heroine. She would have married me in the beginning had I plagued her sufficiently.” I made to speak, but he interrupted me, continuing: “Ah, yes, it might have been better. That is easy to say, not knowing. So, too, it might have been worse--in all probability much the same. All roads lead to the end. You know I was always a fatalist, Paul. We tried both ways. She loved me well enough, but she loved the world also. I thought she loved it better, so I kissed her on her brow, mumbled a prayer for her happiness and made my exit to a choking sob. So ended the first act. Wasn't I the hero throughout that, Paul? I thought so; slapped myself upon the back, told myself what a fine fellow I had been. Then--you know what followed. She was finer clay than she had fancied. Love is woman's kingdom, not the world. Even then I thought more of her than of myself. I could have borne my share of the burden had I not seen her fainting under hers, shamed, degraded. So we dared to think for ourselves, injuring nobody but ourselves, played the man and woman, lost the world for love. Wasn't it brave, Paul? Were we not hero and heroine? They had printed the playbill wrong, Paul, that was all. I was really the hero, but the printing devil had made a slip, so instead of applauding you booed. How could you know, any of you? It was not your fault.” “But that was not the end,” I reminded him. “If the curtain had fallen then, I could have forgiven you.” He grinned. “That fatal last act. Even yours don't always come right, so the critics tell me.”