"Miss Lermontof!" she exclaimed. "I had no idea that you lived here."
Miss Lermontof nodded a brief greeting.
"How d'you do? Yes, I've lived here for some time. But I didn't know
that you were coming. I thought you had rooms somewhere?"
"So I had. But I was obliged to give them up, and Signor Baroni
suggested this instead."
"Hope you'll like it," returned Miss Lermontof shortly. "At any rate, it
has the advantage of being only quarter of an hour's walk from
Grellingham Place. I've just come from there." And with that she
relapsed into silence.
Although Olga Lermontof had frequently accompanied Diana during her
lessons with Baroni, the acquaintance between the two had made but small
progress. There had been but little opportunity for conversation on
those occasions, and Diana, instinctively resenting the accompanist's
cool and rather off-hand manner, had never sought to become better
acquainted with her. It was generally supposed that she was a Russian,
and she was undoubtedly a highly gifted musician, but there was something
oddly disagreeable and repellent about her personality. Whenever Diana
had thought about her at all, she had mentally likened her to Ishmael,
whose hand was against every man and every man's hand against his. And
now she found herself involved with this strange woman in the rather
close intimacy of daily life consequent upon becoming fellow-boarders in
the same house.
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