united those floating wisps of feeling which she had felt, but
never believed, concerning her possible ability, and made them
into a gaudy shred of hope. Like all human beings, she had a
touch of vanity. She felt that she could do things if she only
had a chance. How often had she looked at the well-dressed
actresses on the stage and wondered how she would look, how
delightful she would feel if only she were in their place. The
glamour, the tense situation, the fine clothes, the applause,
these had lured her until she felt that she, too, could act--that
she, too, could compel acknowledgment of power. Now she was told
that she really could--that little things she had done about the
house had made even him feel her power. It was a delightful
sensation while it lasted.

When Drouet was gone, she sat down in her rocking-chair by the
window to think about it. As usual, imagination exaggerated the
possibilities for her. It was as if he had put fifty cents in
her hand and she had exercised the thoughts of a thousand
dollars. She saw herself in a score of pathetic situations in
which she assumed a tremulous voice and suffering manner. Her
mind delighted itself with scenes of luxury and refinement,
situations in which she was the cynosure of all eyes, the arbiter
of all fates. As she rocked to and fro she felt the tensity of
woe in abandonment, the magnificence of wrath after deception,
the languour of sorrow after defeat. Thoughts of all the
charming women she had seen in plays--every fancy, every illusion
which she had concerning the stage--now came back as a returning
tide after the ebb. She built up feelings and a determination
which the occasion did not warrant.