’My jewel, you don’t know who Villedo is!  Villedo is the director of the Opera Comique in Paris, the most artistic opera-house in Europe.  He used to beg me every time we met to write him an opera.’

‘And why didn’t you?’

’Because I had neither the subject nor the time.  One doesn’t write operas after lunch in hotel parlours; and as for a good libretto—­well, outside Wagner, there’s only one opera in the world with a good libretto, and that’s Carmen.’

Diaz, who had had a youthful operatic work performed at the Royal School of Music in London, and whose numerous light compositions for the pianoforte had, of course, enjoyed a tremendous vogue, was much more serious about his projected opera than I had imagined.  He had frequently mentioned it to me, but I had not thought the idea was so close to his heart as I now perceived it to be.  I had written the libretto to amuse myself, and perhaps him, and lo! he was going to excite himself; I well knew the symptoms.

‘You wrote it in that little book,’ he said.  ’You haven’t got it in your pocket?’

‘No,’ I answered.  ‘I haven’t even a pocket.’

He would not laugh.

‘Come,’ he said—­’come, let’s see it.’

He gathered up his loose rein and galloped off.  He could not wait an instant.

‘Come along!’ he cried imperiously, turning his head.

‘I am coming,’ I replied; ’but wait for me.  Don’t leave me like that, Diaz.’

The old fear seized me, but nothing could stop him, and I followed as fast as I dared.

‘Where is it?’ he asked, when we reached home.

‘Upstairs,’ I said.

And he came upstairs behind me, pulling my habit playfully, in an effort to persuade us both that his impatience was a simulated one.  I had to find my keys and unlock a drawer.  I took the small, silk-bound volume from the back part of the drawer and gave it to him.

‘There!’ I exclaimed.  ‘But remember lunch is ready.’

He regarded the book.

‘What a pretty binding!’ he said.  ‘Who worked it?’

‘I did.’

‘And, of course, your handwriting is so pretty, too!’ he added, glancing at the leaves. ‘"La Valliere, an opera in three acts."’

We exchanged a look, each of us deliciously perturbed, and then he ran off with the book.

He had to be called three times from the garden to lunch, and he brought the book with him, and read it in snatches during the meal, and while sipping his coffee.  I watched him furtively as he turned over the pages.

‘Oh, you’ve done it!’ he said at length—­’you’ve done it!  You evidently have a gift for libretto.  It is neither more nor less than perfect!  And the subject is wonderful!’

He rose, walked round the table, and, taking my head between his hands, kissed me.

‘Magda,’ he said, ‘you’re the cleverest girl that was ever born.’

‘Then, do you think you will compose it?’ I asked, joyous.