As she spoke the last words she raised the front lid of the piano, and Margaret turned on her seat towards the instrument to open the keyboard, nodding her assent.

‘Just play a little, till I am out of the room, and then sing,’ said Lady Maud.

The great artist’s fingers felt the keys as her friend turned away.  Anything theatrical was natural to her now, and she began to play very softly, watching the moving figure in black velvet as she would have watched a fellow singer on the stage while waiting to go on.

Lady Maud did not speak to Van Torp first, but to Griggs, and then to Logotheti, and the two men slipped away together and disappeared.  Then she came back to Van Torp, smiling pleasantly.  He was still talking with Lord Creedmore, but the latter, at a word from his daughter, went off to the elderly peeress whom Logotheti had abruptly left alone before the portrait.

Margaret did not hear what Lady Maud said to the American, but it was evidently not yet a warning, for her smile did not falter, and he looked pleased as he came back with her, and they passed near the piano to go out through the open window upon the broad flagged terrace that separated the house from the flower-beds.

The Primadonna played a little louder now, so that every one heard the chords, even in the picture-gallery, and a good many men were rather bored at the prospect of music.

Then the Senorita da Cordova raised her head and looked over the grand piano, and her lips parted, and boredom vanished very suddenly; for even those who did not take much pleasure in the music were amazed by the mere sound of her voice and by its incredible flexibility.

She meant to astonish her hearers and keep them quiet, and she knew what to sing to gain her end, and how to sing it.  Those who have not forgotten the story of her beginnings will remember that she was a thorough musician as well as a great singer, and was one of those very few primadonnas who are able to accompany themselves from memory without a false note through any great piece they know, from Lucia to Parsifal.

She began with the waltz song in the first act of Romeo and Juliet.  It was the piece that had revealed her talent to Madame Bonanni, who had accidentally overheard her singing to herself, and it suited her purpose admirably.  Such fireworks could not fail to astound, even if they did not please, and half the full volume of her voice was more than enough for the long drawing-room, into which the whole party gathered almost as soon as she began to sing.  Such trifles as having just dined, or having just waked up in the morning, have little influence on the few great natural voices of the world, which begin with twice the power and beauty that the ‘built-up’ ones acquire in years of study.  Ordinary people go to a concert, to the opera, to a circus, to university sports, and hear and see things that interest or charm, or sometimes surprise them; but they are very much amazed if they ever happen to find out in private life what a really great professional of any sort can do at a pinch, if put to it by any strong motive.  If it had been necessary, Margaret could have sung to the party in the drawing-room at Craythew for an hour at a stretch with no more rest than her accompaniments afforded.