"Yes," she replied. "I know it all."
The old maestro's eyes softened as they rested upon her, and when he spoke again, his queer husky voice was toned to a note of extraordinary sweetness.
"My dear pupil, if it had been possible, I would haf spared you this knowledge. It was wrong of Olga to tell you—above all"—his face creasing with anxiety as the ruling passion asserted itself irrepressibly—"to tell you on a day when you haf to sing!"
"I made her," answered Diana listlessly. She passed her hand wearily across her forehead. "Don't worry, Maestro, I shall be able to sing to-night."
"Tiens! But you are all to pieces, my child! You will drink a glass of champagne—now, at once," he insisted, adding persuasively as she shook her head, "To please me, is it not so?"
Diana's lips curved in a tired smile.
"Is champagne the cure for a heartache, then, Maestro?"
Baroni's eyes grew suddenly sad.
"Ah, my dear, only death—or a great love—can heal the wound that lies
in the heart," he answered gently. He paused, then resumed crisply:
"But, meanwhile, we haf to live—and prima donnas haf to sing.
So . . . the little glass of wine in my room, is it not?"
He tucked her arm within his, patting her hand paternally, and led her into his own sanctum, where he settled her comfortably in a big easy-chair beside the fire, and poured her out a glass of wine, watching her sip it with a glow of satisfaction in his eyes.