To resolve it after the curtain had fallen upon a first act that had gone with a verve unrivalled until this hour in the annals of the company, borne almost entirely upon the slim shoulders of the new Scaramouche, M. Binet bluntly questioned him.

They were standing in the space that did duty as green-room, the company all assembled there, showering congratulations upon their new recruit.  Scaramouche, a little exalted at the moment by his success, however trivial he might consider it to-morrow, took then a full revenge upon Climene for the malicious satisfaction with which she had regarded his momentary blank terror.

“I do not wonder that you ask,” said he.  “Faith, I should have warned you that I intended to do my best from the start to put the audience in a good humour with me.  Mademoiselle very nearly ruined everything by refusing to reflect any of my terror.  She was not even startled.  Another time, mademoiselle, I shall give you full warning of my every intention.”

She crimsoned under her grease-paint.  But before she could find an answer of sufficient venom, her father was rating her soundly for her stupidity — the more soundly because himself he had been deceived by Scaramouche’s supreme acting.

Scaramouche’s success in the first act was more than confirmed as the performance proceeded.  Completely master of himself by now, and stimulated as only success can stimulate, he warmed to his work.  Impudent, alert, sly, graceful, he incarnated the very ideal of Scaramouche, and he helped out his own native wit by many a remembered line from Beaumarchais, thereby persuading the better informed among the audience that here indeed was something of the real Figaro, and bringing them, as it were, into touch with the great world of the capital.

When at last the curtain fell for the last time, it was Scaramouche who shared with Climene the honours of the evening, his name that was coupled with hers in the calls that summoned them before the curtains.

As they stepped back, and the curtains screened them again from the departing audience, M. Binet approached them, rubbing his fat hands softly together.  This runagate young lawyer, whom chance had blown into his company, had evidently been sent by Fate to make his fortune for him.  The sudden success at Guichen, hitherto unrivalled, should be repeated and augmented elsewhere.  There would be no more sleeping under hedges and tightening of belts.  Adversity was behind him.  He placed a hand upon Scaramouche’s shoulder, and surveyed him with a smile whose oiliness not even his red paint and colossal false nose could dissemble.

“And what have you to say to me now?” he asked him.  “Was I wrong when I assured you that you would succeed?  Do you think I have followed my fortunes in the theatre for a lifetime without knowing a born actor when I see one?  You are my discovery, Scaramouche.  I have discovered you to yourself.  I have set your feet upon the road to fame and fortune.  I await your thanks.”