_Pascaline._ Oh, Marion dear! When one thinks of mama coming back; and of her having no right to enter this house, and of someone else installed in her place! If you only could have seen how sad she was when she left me, my poor mama, who is generally so gay! And no wonder she is sad. All alone there at Auteuil in a little pavilion, Rue des Martyrs, at her office, a stuffy little place without sunshine, without air. _The Nurse._ At her “office”? _Pascaline._ Yes. You must know that, for some time, mama has not been able to sing. It is all the trouble she has gone through. You see to be constantly crying is not good for the voice, so that now she is the directress of an agency for theatrical tours. You can understand that, as I am no longer a child, I have a right to know things. I _do_ know _now_ why papa sent mama away. _Marion._ Did your mother tell you? _Pascaline._ Yes. Papa would not allow her to sing anywhere! So then mama, who had an admirable voice, felt obliged to follow an irresistible vocation. This is the legend as Pascaline has received it from her mother. Marion does not contradict it. Nor yet do Forjot and Hélène ever hint at the true facts of Gabrielle’s desertion. Hélène’s reticence is heroic, for Pascaline becomes more and more bitter against the good Hélène and defies her to justify herself by some real fault discovered in Gabrielle, worse than the noble ambition of a gifted artist. _Pascaline [to Hélène]._ Of course, you are burning to tell me all about poor mama’s divorce. Well: let me show you I know all about it already. I know that, in spite of my father’s orders, mama would go on singing, and then she was rather extravagant, and, well, she was not domesticated, and chose to follow her artistic vocation. There you have the whole story of her sins. Oh, _if_ there _is_ anything else, I invite you, or rather, I require you to tell me. _Was_ there anything else? _Hélène [avoiding Pascaline’s eyes]._ There was nothing else. _Pascaline [triumphantly]._ There, you are forced to admit it! Mama’s _only_ fault was that she had an artistic vocation! Again I beg you to contradict me, if you can. _Was_ there anything else against her? _Hélène._ No; only that—nothing else.