"And so ugly that he was good-looking. Caruso is becoming uneven."
Vaguely the musician considered the novelist. "You think so?"
"It rather looked that way last night."
Angelo Cara plucked again at the rug.
"But," Jones continued, "in the 'Terra addio' he made up for it. What an enchantment that duo is!"
The musician's hand moved from the rug to his face. "You were there then?"
I was this morning, thought Jones, but he said: "How sinful Rigoletto is by comparison to Aïda—by comparison I mean to the last act."
The other duo now had become a quartette. The voices of Gilda and Rigoletto were fusing with those of the figlia and the duke.
The musician appeared to be listening. His sunken eyes were lifted. Slowly he turned them on Jones.
"You didn't see anything, did you?"