ation. For Miss Burgoyne, as she was throwing off her
things, and getting ready for her stage-transformation, kept plying her
guest with all sorts of cunning little questions about Mr.
Moore--questions which had no apparent motive, it is true, so carelessly
were they asked; but Nina, even as she answered, was shrewd enough to
understand.

"So you might call yourself quite an old friend of his," the prima-donna
continued, busying herself at the dressing-table. "Well, what do you
think of him now?"

"How, Miss Burgoyne?" Nina said.

"Why, you see the position he has attained here in London--very
different from what he had when he was studying in Naples, I suppose.
Don't you hear how all those women are spoiling him? What do you think
of that? If I were a friend of his--an intimate friend--I should warn
him. For what will the end be--he'll marry a rich woman, a woman of
fashion, and cease to be anybody. Fancy a man's ruining his
career--giving up his position, his reputation--becoming nobody at
all--in order to have splendid horses and give big dinner-parties! Of
course she'll have her doll, to drive by her side in the Park; but
she'll tire--and then? And he'll get sick-tired, too, and wish he was
back in the theatre; and just as likely as not he'll take to drinking,
or gambling, or something. Depend on it, my dear, a professional should
marry in the profession; that's the only safe thing; then there is a
community of interests, and they understand each other and are glad of
each other's success. Don't you think so yourself?"

Nina was startled by the sudden appeal; but she managed to intimate
that, on the whole, she agreed with Miss Burgoyne; and that young lady
proceeded to expand her little lecture and to cite general instances
that had come within her own knowledge of the disastrous effects of
theatrical people marrying outside their own set. As to any lesson in
the art of making-up, perhaps Miss Burgoyne had forgotten the pretext on
which she asked Nina to come to her room. Her maid was called in to help
her now. And at last it was time for Nina to go, for she also, in her
humble way, had to prepare herself for the performance.

But this friendliness on the part of the prima-donna towards the young
baritone's _protegee_ did not last very long. For one thing, Lionel did
not come to Miss Burgoyne's sitting-room as much as he used to do, to
have a cup of tea and a chat with one or two acquaintances; he preferred
st