HEY sat opposite each other before the brightly burning fire and listened to the rumble and rattle in the street below. A clock ticked peacefully on the mantlepiece, and from time to time the man and the boy glanced up at the slowly moving hands and then at each other.
“She must be here in a minute,” the boy said, with an uncontrollable movement of impatience. “It's over at eleven—half an hour to change, a quarter of an hour to drive here, that makes a quarter to twelve—yes, she ought to be here in five minutes.”
“You leave no margin for accidents or delays, Dicky,” the man observed, smiling faintly. “The mother usually requires more than half an hour to change, you know.”
“Not to-night!” was the quick answer. “She will know how anxious we are and will hurry for all she is worth. By Jove! I wish I had been there. I can fairly hear the people cheering and clapping, can't you? There's no one can sing like the mother, is there?”
“No one,” the man agreed gravely.
Somehow the tone of the reply seemed to trouble his companion. He scrambled out of the arm-chair in which he had been comfortably curled and stood with his back to the fire, looking his father earnestly in the face.
“You think it's all right—that it's a sure thing?” he asked.
The man lifted his eyes from their dreamy contemplation of the flames and looked at the young upright figure in the Eton suit. The Eton suit shone too brightly at the elbows to be elegant, but the face atoned for all other deficiencies. It was a twelve-year-old edition of his own face, without the lines of care and illness, but strong, bold, and handsome in its fearless honesty.
“I hope it's all right, old chap,” he said, “You know, everybody in this world has a different opinion, and though, of course, we are quite right in saying that no one sings like the mother, still, we can't prevent other people from thinking—”
He stopped short. His son's lips had parted, his whole attitude showed that he was not listening to him but to the sounds in the street.
Che next moment with a joyful, ungrammatical cry “It's her!” he sprang over the foot-stool, over a chair, and down the stairs three steps at a time.
Richard Angus, senior, listened to the clatter with a half-melancholy, half-whimsical line about the mouth. He held out his hands to the blaze and began to sing in an undertone, carefully, anxiously, as if he were testing his own voice. It was a rich tenor, but after the first few bars it broke and he sprang to his feet with a smothered exclamation of pain and irritation.
“My God, how long will it last?” he muttered despairingly. “How long must I be a helpless dependent? How long—”
He clenched his teeth on the last bitter complaint and turned, the expression of his face softening as if by magic.
“Nina!” he cried.
Dicky, flushed and breathless, had re-entered the room, but this time he was not alone. A woman stood beside him on the threshold, her arm about his shoulder, her eyes smiling an answering welcome. The bright hair was disordered, the fine though irregular features still bore the traces of paint and powder, and the opera cloak hung from her shoulders as if it had been snatched up in reckless haste. Yet there was a resolute dignity in her bearing and the determined set of the fine mouth made it seem almost hard.
Her husband came unsteadily towards her and she met him half way, resting against his shoulder with a sigh of weariness.
“Oh, I am so glad to be home!” she murmured. “So glad!”
He held her closer with a nervous strength.
“How was it?” he asked. “Did everything go well?”
“Yes. very well. I have never sung better—it was for you and Dicky and my whole soul was in it. And the people cheered me. It was grand—for after all they had never heard of me before.”
“And Herr Grimm—the manager?”
“He, too, was delighted. He congratulated me warmly.”
He looked down into her face and saw that her eyes did not reflect the triumph of her words; they were grave, overcast
“So it's all right—you will be engaged for the next season? The contract is signed?” he questioned.
“No, the contract is not signed,” came the slow answer.
“Why not?”
“Herr Grimm said he was sorry—he could decide nothing until to-morrow night. To-morrow night Senora Veroni is singing 'Carmen.' When he has heard her, he will decide between us.”
“Veroni?” he echoed, doubtfully.
“She is well-known on the Continent and you know her, too—under another name.”
She turned and bent tenderly over the boy beside her.
“Dicky, go to bed now, there's a dear fellow. It's late for you and I have something I must talk to your father about.”