r over three hours, then!'

I sat up.

'Yes,' he said proudly. 'Come along. I want to play you my notion of the
overture. It's only in the rough, but it's there.'

'You've begun with the overture?'

'Why not, my child? Here's your dressing-gown. Which is the top
end of it?'

I followed him downstairs, and sat close by him at the piano, with one
limp hand on his shoulder. There was no light in the drawing-rooms, save
one candle on the piano. My slipper escaped off my bare foot. As Diaz
played he looked at me constantly, demanding my approval, my enthusiasm,
which I gave him from a full heart. I thought the music charming, and, of
course, as he played it...!

'I shall only have three motives,' he said. 'That's the La Valliere
motive. Do you see the idea?'

'You mean she limps?'

'Precisely. Isn't it delightful?'

'She won't have to limp much, you know. She didn't.'

'Just the faintest suggestion. It will be delicious. I can see Morenita
in the part. Well, what do you think of it?'

I could not speak. His appeal, suddenly wistful, moved me so. I leaned
forward and kissed him.

'Dear girl!' he murmured.

Then he blew out the candle. He was beside himself with excitement.

'Diaz,' I cried, 'what's the matter with you? Do have a little sense.
And you've made me lose my slipper.'

'I'll carry you upstairs,' he replied gaily.

A faint illumination came from the hall, so that we could just see each
other. He lifted me off the chair.

'No!' I protested, laughing. 'And my slipper.... The servants!'

'Stuff!'

I was a trifle in those arms.

VI

The triumphal re-entry into the world has just begun, and exactly as Diaz
foretold. And the life of the forest is over. We have come to Paris, and
he has taken Paris, and already he is leaving it for other shores, and I
am to follow. At this moment, while I write because I have not slept and
cannot sleep, his train rolls out of St. Lazare.

Last night! How glorious! But he is no longer wholly mine. The world has
turned his face a little from my face....

It was as if I had never before realized the dazzling significance of
the fame of Diaz. I had only once seen him in public. And though he
conquered in the Jubilee Hall of the Five Towns, his victory, personal
and artistic, at the Opera Comique, before an audience as exacting,
haughty, and experienced as any in Europe, was, of course, infinitely
more striking--a victory worthy of a Diaz.

I sat alone a