“A newspaper woman! And then you will come and interview me. How droll! I shall have to become eccentric, so that I can furnish you with ‘stories,’ as they call them. I have been pumped dry. When the newspaper women have run out of everything else they come to me, and they love me because I am good-natured, and turn my things upside down for them. I never refuse to see them, so they have never written anything horrid about me. Oh, I can tell you I have learned a great many lessons since I left Monterey. But here is your luncheon. While you are eating it I will do something for you that I have never done for any one else off the stage: I will sing to you.”
The maid placed a silver tray on a little table, and while Patience ate of creamed oysters and broiled partridge, Rosita sang as the larks of paradise may sing when angels awake with the dawn. Once Patience glanced hastily upward, half expecting to see the notes falling in a golden shower. When she expressed her admiration, Rosita’s red lips smiled slowly away from the white sharp little teeth.
“Do you like it, Patita mia?” she asked with bewitching graciousness. “Yes, I can sing. I have the world at my feet.”
She resumed her languid attitude on the divan. “Bueno,” she said, “now I am going to tell you all about it. People are always a little heavy after eating; I waited on purpose. But you must promise not to move until I get through. Will you?”
“Yes,” said Patience, uncomfortably. “I hope it is nothing very dreadful.”
“That all depends upon the way you look at things. It will seem odd to tell it to you. You used to be the one to do what you felt like and tell other people that if they did not like it they could do the other thing; but I suppose you are W. C. T. U’d.”
“No, I’m not. Go on.”
“Well, I will.” She paused and laughed lightly. “Funny world. We do not usually tell this sort of story to a woman, but you and I are different. Bueno.
“I went to Paris and studied hard. Yes, I am lazy yet, but I had made up my mind to be a great, great, great success. I had what in insane people is called the fixed idea, and the American in me conquered the Spanish. Everybody praised my voice. No one said it was the greatest voice in the world, nor even better than two or three others over there; but I had no discouragement. I attracted a great deal of attention from men, but the dueña never let them get a word with me, and I did not care. I used to wonder at the stories told about some of the other girls, and did not half understand. Two sold themselves; but why? with a fortune in one’s throat. Others fell in love, and talked about the temperament of the artist, but I could not understand that nonsense either.
“Bueno, at the end of the time Soper came over and bought me eight trunks full of the most beautiful clothes you ever saw,—mostly for the stage, but lots for the house and street. He said I was a first-class investment, and worth the outlay. When he heard me sing he shook all over. I ought to tell you that I had been kept on short allowance, and had had very dowdy clothes, which broke my heart.