He was in earnest; and it did not seem hard to him that in trying to secure her happiness he had perhaps lost his own.
CHAPTER XXII.
"A Grand Morning Concert will be given on Thursday, June 25th, at Ebury's Rooms, by the pupils of Madame della Scala. By kind permission of Mr. Mapleson, the following artistes will appear." Then followed a list of well known operatic vocalists, also Miss This, That, and the other—"and Miss Cynthia West." The last half-dozen names were not as yet famous.
The above intimation, together with much detail concerning time, place, and performers, was printed on a very large gilt-edged card; and two such cards, enclosed in a thick square envelope, lay upon Hubert Lepel's breakfast-table some months after the New Year's holiday which he had spent at Beechfield Hall.
He looked at them with an amused, interested smile, and read the words more than once—then, with equal interest, perused a programme of the concert, which had also been enclosed.
"So it is to-day, is it?" he said to himself, as he finished his cup of coffee. "She is late in sending me a ticket; I shall scarcely be able to nail any of the critics for her now. I would have got Gurney to write her a notice if I had known earlier. Probably that is the very reason why she did not let me know—independent young woman that she is! I'll go and see what I can do for her even at the eleventh hour. She shall have a good big bouquet for her début, at any rate!"
He sallied forth, making his way to his club, where he found occasion to remark to more than one of his friends that Madame della Scala's concert would be worth going to, and that a young lady who had formerly been known in the theatrical world—Miss Cynthia West—would make her début as a public singer that afternoon. Meeting Marcus Gurney, the well-known musical critic of an influential paper, soon afterwards, he pressed upon him his spare ticket for the concert, and gave him to understand that it would be a really good-natured thing if he could turn in at Ebury's Rooms between three and four, and write something for the Scourge that would not injure that very promising débutante, Miss West. Marcus Gurney laughed and consented, and Hubert went off well pleased; he had at least stopped the mouth of the bitterest critic in London, he reflected—for, though Gurney was personally one of the most amiable of men, he could be very virulent in print. Then he went off to Covent Garden, and selected two of the loveliest bouquets he could find—one, of course, for Cynthia, and one for her teacher, Madame della Scala. For Hubert was wise in his generation.
He had seen very little of Cynthia West during the last few months, and had not heard her sing at all. Shortly after his second interview with her, he had sent her to Italy for the winter, so that she might have a course of lessons from the most celebrated teacher in Milan. He was gratified to hear that there had been at least nothing to unlearn. Old Lalli had done his work very thoroughly; he had trained her voice as only a skilled musician could have done; and, on hearing who had been her teacher, the great Italian maestro had thrown up his hands and asked her why she came to him.
"You will have no need of me," he had said to her. "Lalli—did you not know?—he was once our primo tenore in opera! He would have been great—ah, great—if he had not lost his voice in an expedition to your terrible England! So he stayed there and played the violon, did he? And he taught you to sing with your mouth round and close like that—my own method! La, la, la, la! We shall see you at La Scala before we have done!"