Her manner was so tentative and humble, so much that of one who scarce feels a right even to plead, so different from that of the old petted and radiant Madge, that ’twould have taken a harder man than Philip to decline.  And so, when the servant had placed additional chairs, down we sat to supper with Miss Warren, of Drury Lane Theatre, who had sent her maid to answer the inquiries of the alarmed house concerning the recent tumult in the street.

CHAPTER XX.

We Intrude upon a Gentleman at a Coffee-house.

Little was eaten at that supper, to which we sat down in a constraint natural to the situation.  Philip was presently about to assume the burden of opening the conversation, when Madge abruptly began: 

“I make no doubt you recognised him, Bert—­the man with the coach.”

“Yes.  Philip and I saw him outside the theatre.”

“And followed him, in following you,” added Philip.  “We had intended—­”

“You must not suppose—­” she interrupted; but, after a moment’s halt of embarrassment, left the sentence unfinished, and made another beginning:  “I never saw him or heard of him, after I left New York, till I had been three years on the stage.  Then, when the war was over, he came back to London, and chanced to see me play at Drury Lane.  He knew me in spite of my stage name, and during that very performance I found him waiting in the greenroom.  I had no desire for any of his society, and told him so.  But it seems that, finding me—­admired, and successful in the way I had resorted to, he could not be content till he regained my—­esteem.  If I had shown myself friendly to him then, I should soon have been rid of him:  but instead, I showed a resolution to avoid him; and he is the kind of man who can’t endure a repulse from a woman.  To say truth, he thinks himself invincible to ’em all, and when he finds one of ’em proof against him, even though she may once have seemed—­when she didn’t know her mind—­well, she is the woman he must be pestering, to show that he’s not to be resisted.

“And so, at last, to be rid of his plaguing, I went away from London, and took another stage name, and acted in the country.  Only Mr. and Mrs. Sheridan were in the secret of this:  ’twas Mr. Sheridan gave me letters to the country managers.  That was in the Fall of ’83.  Well, I heard after awhile that he too had gone into the country, to dance attendance on an old aunt, whose heir he had got the chance of being, through his cousin’s death.  But I knew if I came back to London he would hear of it, and then, sure, farewell to all my peace!  He had continually threatened to carry me off in a coach to some village by the Channel, and take me across to France in a fishing-smack.  When I declared I would ask the magistrates for protection, he said they would laugh at me as a play-actress trying to make herself talked about.  I took that to be true, and so, as I’ve told you, I left London.