Why he should have experienced an extraordinary sensation of embarrassment and dismay Austin really did not know, but he certainly did so, as from a big chair in the dusk beyond the grand piano Winnie rose and came towards him.
“Winnie! I didn’t think to meet you here,” he murmured confusedly.
“Nor I you,” said Winnie. “I returned yesterday.”
“I know. I was coming around to see you to-morrow. Did you have a good time, dear?”
“Quite good—thanks. But I must be off now. Good-bye, maestro, and——”
“But no, no, you must not go!” protested Cacciola. “Giulia will bring in tea in one moment now—Maddelena will hasten her—real Russian tea that Boris has taught us to like, and it is so good for the voice too! Also you must sing again presently. We have not got that new song right yet.”
“I’m so tired, maestro, and I couldn’t sing after Mr. Melikoff. How splendid he is!”
“Pouff! Not sing again indeed; you must not talk like an amateur. You are an artiste, and among ourselves we never make comparisons. Though there can never be any comparison with Boris: he is unique! How thankful I am—and so is my Maddelena—that he is recovering himself. Now sit down again, my child, and here is a chair for Mr. Starr.”
Maddelena had taken her uncle’s hint and gone to hurry up Giulia with the tea, and Boris followed her. Austin heard her laugh as they went along the passage. Truly the atmosphere here had changed marvellously in these few days. He sat down in the chair Cacciola had pulled up close to Winnie’s, but for once in his life could find nothing to say to her; while she virtually ignored him, and chatted with the maestro till the tea appeared, brought in procession by Giulia and the two young people.
Maddelena, in the highest spirits, was a charming hostess, and, like her uncle, treated Austin with the easy familiarity of old friendship. It was merely their unconventional, hospitable way, as Winnie at least knew perfectly well, from her long acquaintance with the maestro, though she had never happened to meet Maddelena till now; yet she wondered how often he had been there of late, and why he had said nothing about it.