When she had dragged the things frantically out, she wrote to Amiens, making herself responsible for the monthly payments. "All that his mother did _I_ will do!" she wrote, feeling less criminal for the phrase. And then one morning, tortured, she caught the express to the town to see that all was well. The place was small and poor; and though the baby looked well cared for, and the young woman and her husband seemed kind, the visit was horrible to her. Next day she spent some of the stolen money on a baby's bonnet and pelisse. And as the quality of the gift suggested means, she received, before the date for her second remittance, a scrawl declaring that the cost of provisions had risen dreadfully, and asking for twenty francs a month more. "RÉCITAL DONNÉ PAR MADEMOISELLE MARIE LAMANDE." A blue-and-white poster, with her name staring Paris in the face. The time came when she saw one on a wall, and stopped, thrilling at it in the rain. A week afterwards she saw one on a wall again, and passed it with a sigh, remembering the half-empty salle, and the cheques that she had drawn. "Patience, mademoiselle, patience. An artist does not arrive in a day; one must persevere." There were plenty of persons to give her encouragement now that it might be advantageous to them. But the expense of her début was a warning, and she proceeded slowly. Though they made her feel very shy and cowardly, she did not succumb to the arguments of vehement people who offered "opportunities the most exceptional" at a big price, and whose attitudes of amazement implied that she must be brainless to decline. She did not waste money in bettering her abode. She did not, when she had given a recital again, continue to imagine that the prize had provided a sum abundant for her purpose. The knowledge obsessed her that she owed this money, that one day she was to repay it. For a year she told herself, "The road is harder than I thought, but I shall reach the end of it in time!" During the second year she struggled in a panic, while the money was melting, melting without result. To adventure a concert meant such wearisome, such overwhelming preparation. And within a week it was as if it had never been--she was again forgotten. But she saw a little chorus-girl, who had done something more than ordinarily immodest, launch herself into celebrity in a night. At last, when she realised that she had wrecked her peace of mind for nothing, when to cross the bridge was to eye the river longingly, she knew that she wasn't free to find oblivion like that. Restitution to the child would be impossible, but it was her destiny to support him. She wrote to madame Herbelin, in Chauville, appealing for influence to regain the footing that she had kicked away. Her bent face was wet and ugly as she detailed the story of her failure; she foresaw the greetings, tactful, but galling, of acquaintances, the half-veiled satisfaction of other music-mistresses in the town.