ant success of his song took away from him an excuse which
he might otherwise have made, when Charmian and Alston Lake urged him to
compose with a view to pleasing the public taste; by which they both
meant the taste of the cultivated public which was now becoming widely
diffused, and which had acquired power. He could not say that his talent
was one which had no appeal to the world, that he was incapable of
pleasing. One song was nothing. So he declared. Charmian and Alston Lake
in their enthusiasm elevated it into a great indication, lifted it up
like a lamp till it seemed to shed rays of light on the way in which
they urged Claude to walk.

He had long abandoned his violin concerto, and had worked on a setting
of the _Belle Dame Sans Merci_ for soprano, chorus, and orchestra. But
before it was finished--and during the season his time for work was
limited, owing to the numerous social engagements in which Charmian and
Alston Lake involved him--an event took place which had led directly to
the packing of those boxes which now stood ready for a journey. Jacob
Crayford reappeared in London after putting Europe through his sieve.
And Claude was introduced to him by Alston Lake, who insisted on his
patron hearing Claude's song.

Mr. Crayford did not care very much about the song. A song was not a big
proposition, and he was accustomed to think in operas. But his fondness
for Lake, and Lake's boyish enthusiasm for Claude, led him to pay some
attention to the latter. He was a busy man and did not waste much time.
But he was a sharp man and a man on the look-out for talent. Apparently
this Claude Heath had some talent, not much developed perhaps as yet.
But then he was young. In Claude's appearance and personality there was
something arresting. "Looks as if there might be something there," was
Crayford's silent comment. And then he admired Charmian and thought her
"darned cute." He openly chaffed her on her careful silence about her
husband's profession when they had met at Mrs. Shiffney's. "So you
wanted to know the great fighter, did you?" he said, pulling at the
little beard with a nervous hand, and twitching his eyebrows. "And if he
hadn't happened to have one opera house, and to be thinking about
running up another, much you'd have cared about his fighting."

"My husband is not a composer of operas, Mr. Crayford," observed
Charmian demurely.

From Alston Lake had come the urgent advice to Claude to try his hand on
an