Part 42 (2/2)

”Mere concert work”--wrote one critic--”will never give her the scope which both her temperament and her marvellous voice demand.”

And with this opinion Baroni cordially concurred. It was his ultimate ambition for Diana that she should study for grand opera, and she herself, only too thankful to find something that would occupy her thoughts and take her right out of herself, as it were, enabling her to forget the overthrow of her happiness, flung herself into the work with enthusiasm.

Gradually, as time pa.s.sed on, her bitter feelings towards Max softened a little. That light, half-ironical manner he had a.s.sumed brought back to her so vividly the Max Errington of the early days of their acquaintance that it recalled, too, a measure of the odd attraction he had held for her in that far-away time.

That he still visited Adrienne very frequently she was aware, but often, on his return from Somervell Street, he seemed so much depressed that she began at last to wonder whether those visits were really productive of any actual enjoyment. Possibly she had misjudged them--her husband and her friend--and it might conceivably be really only business matters which bound them together after all.

If so--if that were true--how wantonly she had flung away her happiness!

Late one afternoon, Max, who had been out since early morning, came in looking thoroughly worn out. His eyes, ringed with fatigue, held an alert look of strain and anxiety for which Diana was at a loss to account.

She was at the piano when he entered the room, idly trying over some MS.

songs that had been submitted by aspiring composers anxious to secure her interest.

”Why, Max,” she exclaimed, genuine concern in her voice, as she rose from the piano. ”How worried you look! What is the matter?”

”Nothing,” he returned. ”At least, nothing in which you can help,” he added hastily. ”Unless--”

”Unless what? Please . . . let me help . . . if I can.” Diana spoke rather nervously. She was suddenly struck by the fact that the last few months had been responsible for a great change in her husband's appearance. He looked much thinner and older than formerly, she thought.

There were hara.s.sed lines in his face, and its worn contours and shadowed eyes called aloud to the compa.s.sionate womanhood within her, to the mother-instinct that involuntarily longs to heal and soothe.

”Tell me what I can do, Max?”

A smile curved his lips, half whimsical, half sad.

”You can do for me what you do for all the rest of the world--I won't ask more of you,” he replied. ”Sing to me.”

Diana coloured warmly. The first part of his speech stung her unbearably.

”Sing to you?” she repeated.

”Yes. I'm very tired, and nothing is more restful than music.” Then, as she hesitated, he added, ”Unless, of course, I'm asking too much.”

”You know you are not,” she answered swiftly.

She resumed her place at the piano, and, while he lay back in his chair with closed eyes, she sang to him--the music of the old masters who loved melody, and into whose songs the bitterness and unrest of the twentieth century had not crept.

Presently, she thought, he slept, and very softly her hands strayed into the simple, sorrowful music of ”The Haven of Memory,” and a note of wistful appeal, not all of art, added a new depth to the exquisite voice.

How once your love But crowned and blessed me only, Long and long ago.

The refrain died into silence, and Diana, looking up, found Max's piercing blue eyes fixed upon her. He was not asleep, then, after all.

He smiled slightly as their glances met.

”Do you remember I once told you I thought 'The h.e.l.l of Memory' would be a more appropriate t.i.tle? . . . I was quite right.”

”Max--” Diana's voice quavered and broke.

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