The sad, grieving words wrung his heart.
"Why, yes," he said unsteadily. "That's the biggest thing in the world—our love—isn't it? But this other is a debt of honour, and you wouldn't want me to shirk that, would you, sweet? I must pay—even if it costs me my happiness. . . . It may seem to you as though I'd set your happiness, too, aside. God knows, it hasn't been easy! But what could I do? I conceive that a man's honour stands before everything. That was why I let you believe—what you did. My word was given. I couldn't clear myself. . . . So you see, now, beloved, why we must part."
"No," she said quietly. "I don't see. Why can't I come to Ruvania with you?"
A sudden light leaped into his eyes, but it died away almost instantly.
He shook his head.
"No, you can't come with me. Because—don't you see, dear?"—very gently and pitifully. "As my wife, as cousin of the Grand Duchess herself, you couldn't still be—a professional singer."
There was a long silence. Slowly Diana drew away from her husband, staring at him with dilated eyes.
"Then that—that was what Baroni meant when, he told me a time would come when your wife could no longer sing in public?"
Max bent his head.
"Yes. That was what he meant."
Diana stood silently clasping and unclasping her hands. Presently she spoke again, and there was a new note in her voice—a note of quiet gravity and steadfast decision.