The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1907-12-09

he took his place again in the orcnes-
ira. During the second act he scarce
ly paid any attention to the score. He
watched the stage all the time.
During the third scene in the noun
tains, where Carmen appeals to the
cards and is warned of her fate. tears
stood in the eyes of the man.
He carried his violin with him when
the act was over and put it in its case.
Il am ill.," he said, Il am not going
to play any more"
They looked at him and whispered.
He knew they were talking about him.
but he did not care.
He sat down, moody and silent His
thoughts had carried him far back in
to the past and as urging wave of rage
and jealousy seized him.
He thought of a woman, as young
it'll now, whom he had worship
ped with all his heart and soul. He
recalled happy days, they had spent
together when money was earned cas-
lily and the summer days were long.
smile wreathed his lips at the
thought. Then he recalled blacker,
gloomier days, when jealousy had
torn at his heart-stringS, when poverty
had come to them and some OF Mad.
ame's rich friends, had tempted her
from him. Like flash he remember
ed how he had returned one night to
the rooms they had shared together
at Remington to find them deserted.
His wife had left him, taking their
child with her, and leaving only a
brief, but loving note behind.
The years that followed had been
full of agony to him. He scarcely
knew what had happened to him. He
went to the dogs. He changed his
name He refused to mix with those
who had been his friends. 1t was only
the necessity Of living that had drawn
him into the orchestra-he who, in
his day. in the brief period before i'll
ness had stricken him down, had been
looked upon as perhaps the finest vio-
linist in the world.
So absorbed was he in his thoughts
that he did not notice the arrival of
the King.
Philips Legrando had subsisted he
scarcely knew how. He had drunk his
cup of bitterness to the dregs. The
cutters of the artistic world had
claimed him for many a year past.
and he did not care. il was only the
sight of his daughter-rich, prosper
Gus, triumphant, claiming the homage
of the musical world, as her own in
the part of Carme made his
pulse beat quicker and the blood rush
to his head.
And Fortunac had said that of ner
and Mires? Besides what had he not
| heard and seen himself. that evening
at the stage door? The violinist
clenched his hands and beads of per.
spiration stood out upon his brow.
When last he had seen his little
child she was a little thing. scarcely
years old. an innocent prattling chick.
Yet he had recognized her from the
first She was so like her mother.
And like her mother in other things,
too. She was false. wicked She would
ruin mems lives as her mother had
done. He gritted his teeth, and with
a fixed resolve in his heart, he hurried
TO the wardrobe room, found a costume
that would suit him, and rapidly dress.
ed himself in 1t. Then he went down
to the musicians dressing room For
tunac had knife with q long. tapering
blade. He knew where to find il. and
took it with him up to the stage
The curtain had been rung up. The
Toreador's march was being played
The brilliant cavalcade was entering
the arena. Last of all came Carmen,
and Escamillo. The Toreador raised
his hat in salute to the beautiful Car
men. and then the woman was left
alone with Don Jose, the man she had
ruined.
Mires could act In the great scene
that followed, both artists played their
parts for all they were worth. and
when the final scene came where the
fierce and jealous discarded lover
stabs to the heart the woman who has
betrayed him, and Carmen falls dead
upon the STAGE the audience stood ID
and shouted. Then as Don Jose stood
! staring in horror at the dead body OF
the woman he had loved, a figure clad