“Mr. Ward?” Carlota smiled. “When did he say that? Not to-day surely?”
“You are concealing something from me.” Maria bent over her with wide, accusing eyes, even while her fingers stroked her hair fondly. “Ah, if I had never gone to Casanova’s reception, I might have saved you everything, the wild escapade at this Mrs. Nevins’s, the exposé, the loss of the jewels, the horror of last night—Now, behold, your career is ruined.”
Carlota was silent, her eyes bright with anger. It was all they thought of, the money which Ward had given for her musical education, the door which he might have opened for her to success. They thought that life was made up only of achievement. Even Maria, whom she had loved and leaned upon always, had veered completely over to the enemy, and found a sacred obligation in keeping her thus, behind the wall of Tittani. She closed her eyes as Maria’s voice declaimed solemnly:
“With the world at her feet, Paoli tossed it aside like a withered flower and retired to her villa with only her friends and her memories. Bianca, your beloved mother, fled with her love and died, still half a child. This is only the very first false dawn of love, carina. You will forget him in a month. Ah, if I could but take you back, for even a little while, to the garden.”
“If you try to part us, I will never sing again,” Carlota told her tragically. “I will never accept any aid from Mr. Ward again.”
“Then you are what Jacobelli called you, an ingrate, after all the love and hope we have lavished upon you.” Maria was weeping plenteously, helplessly, as she realized the power behind Carlota’s words.
The outer bell rang, silencing the argument. Hurriedly she went to open it, while the girl slipped from the bed, flung a silk robe over her shoulders, and slipped her feet into satin mules. If it should be Griffeth, if he had really dared to come again to penetrate her tower of durance, she would force them to let her see him. She listened eagerly for his voice. Instead it was a messenger boy, bearing Ames’s first shell into the enemy’s camp. He had gone from the telephone booth, and had spent all he had in an orgy of roses from a flower-stand.
“Return them. There is no answer,” Maria said firmly.
But the boy was loyal. Stolidly he insisted there was no place to return them. The gentleman had gone on his way. In the doorway Carlota appeared suddenly and Maria stepped back from the look in her eyes as she took the long box as if it had been a tiny bambino. Holding it close to her breast, she went back to her bed, her chin pressed against it.
“I shall not even speak to you or look at you, if you treat me like this, Maria. I am not a child,” she said haughtily. “Whatever he sends to me, you will regard it as sacred.”