"Lalli--did you not
know?--he was once our _primo tenore_ in opera! He would have been
great--ah, great--if he had not lost his voice in an expedition to your
terrible England! So he stayed there and played the violon, did he? And
he taught you to sing with your mouth round and close like that--my own
method! La, la, la, la! We shall see you at La Scala before we have
done!"

But, when the spring came, and he himself was about to fulfil an
engagement in Berlin, he handed Cynthia over to the care of Madame della
Scala, who was then going to England, and advised her to sing in
public--even to take a professional engagement--if she had the chance,
and, if not, to spend another winter under his tuition in Milan. So
Cynthia came back to London in May, and lived with Madame della Scala,
and was heard by nobody until the day of the annual semi-private
concert, which Madame della Scala loved to give for the benefit of
herself and her best pupils.

Hubert reached the rooms at three precisely. He might easily have sent
in his name and obtained a little chat with Cynthia beforehand in the
artists' room; but he did not care to do that. He wanted to see her
first; he was curious to know whether her new experiences had taken
effect upon her, and how she would bear herself before her judges. He
had seen her once only since her return from Italy, and then but for a
few minutes in the society of other people. He could not tell whether
she was changed or not; and he was curious to know.

She had written to him from Italy several times--letters like herself,
vivacious, sparkling, full of spirit and humor. He knew her very well
from these letters, and he was inclined to wish that he knew her better.
He would see how she looked before she knew that he was present; it
would be amusing to note whether she found him out or not.

Thus he argued to himself; and then, with perverse want of logic, after
saying that he did not wish her to know that he was there, he sent his
bouquets to the green-room for teacher and pupil alike, and compromised
matters by attaching his card to Madame's bouquet only, and not to that
which he sent to Cynthia West--a feeble compromise certainly, and
entirely ineffectual.

He seated himself on a green-colored bench on the right-hand side of the
room, and looked around him at the audience. It consisted largely of
mothers and other relatives of the pupils, some of whom came from the
most aristocratic houses in Engl