Only now and again a long, shuddering sigh
escaped her, like the caught breath of a child that has cried till it
is utterly exhausted and can cry no more.
She felt that she had come to an end of things. Nothing could undo the
past, and ahead of her stretched the future, empty and void of promise.
Presently the creak of the door reopening roused her, and she turned,
instantly on the defensive, anticipating that Olga had come back to
renew the struggle. But it was only Baroni, who approached her with a
look of infinite concern on his kind old face.
"My child!" he began. "My child! . . . So, then! You know all that
there is to know."
Diana looked up wearily.
"Yes," she replied. "I know it all."
The old _maestro's_ eyes softened as they rested upon her, and when he
spoke again, his queer husky voice was toned to a note of extraordinary
sweetness.
"My dear pupil, if it had been possible, I would haf spared you this
knowledge. It was wrong of Olga to tell you--above all"--his face
creasing with anxiety as the ruling passion asserted itself
irrepressibly--"to tell you on a day when you haf to sing!"
"I made her," answered Diana listlessly. She passed her hand wearily
across her forehead. "Don't worry, _Maestro_, I shall be able to sing
to-night."
"_Tiens_! But you are all to pieces, my child! You will drink a glass
of champagne--now, at once," he insisted, adding persuasively as she
shook her head, "To please me, is it not so?"
Diana's lips curved in a tired smile.
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