"And you don't believe it now?"
"To-night I do not. What I shall feel to-morrow I cannot tell. Maybe I shall go blind again, for women are never two days alike in their minds or bodies." She threw up her hands with a despairing helplessness. "But we shall not meet till to-morrow, and then I go back to London. I am going to my room now. You may tell Mrs. Byng that I am not well enough to sing—and indeed I am not well," she added, huskily. "I am sick at heart with I don't know what; but I am wretched and angry and dangerous—and bad."
Her eyes fastened his with a fateful bitterness and gloom. "Where is Mr. Byng?" she added, sharply. "Why was he not at dinner?"
He hailed the change of idea gladly. He spoke quickly, eagerly. "He was kept at the mine. There's trouble—a strike. He was needed. He has great influence with the men, and the masters, too. You heard Mrs. Byng say why he had not returned."
"No; I was thinking of other things. But I wanted—I want to see him. When will he be back?"
"At any moment, I should think. But, Al'mah, no matter what you feel about me, you must keep your engagement to sing here. The people in there, a hundred of the best people of the county—"
"The best people of the county—such abject snobbery!" she retorted, sharply. "Do you think that would influence me? You ought to know me well enough—but that's just it, you do not know me. I realize it at last. Listen now. I will not sing to-night, and you will go and tell Mrs. Byng so."
Once again she turned away, but her exit was arrested by another voice, a pleasant voice, which said:
"But just one minute, please. Mr. Fellowes is quite right.... Fellowes, won't you go and say that Madame Al'mah will be there in five minutes?"
It was Ian Stafford. He had come at Jasmine's request to bring Al'mah, and he had overheard her last words. He saw that there had been a scene, and conceived that it was the kind of quarrel which could be better arranged by a third disinterested person.