For hours after Olga’s departure she fought down the temptation to follow her advice and question her husband.  She could not bring herself to hurt him—­as it must do if he guessed that she distrusted him.  But neither could she conquer the suspicions that had leaped to life within her.  At last, for the time being, love obtained the mastery—­won the first round of the struggle.

“I will trust him,” she told herself.  “And—­and whether I trust him or not,” she ended up defiantly, “at least he shall never know, never see it, if—­if I can’t.”

So that it was a very sweet and repentant, if rather wan, Diana that greeted her husband when he returned from the afternoon rehearsal at the theatre.

Max’s keen eyes swept the white, shadowed face.

“Has Miss Lermontof been here to-day?” he asked abruptly.

“Yes.”  A burning flush chased away her pallor as she answered his question.

“I see.”

“You see?”—­nervously.  “What do you see?”

A very gentle expression came into Max’s eyes.

“I see,” he said kindly, “that I have a tired wife.  You mustn’t let Baroni and Miss Lermontof work you too hard between them.”

“Oh, they don’t, Max.”

“All right, then.  Only”—­cupping her chin in his hand and turning her face up to his—­“I notice I often have a somewhat worried-looking wife after one of Miss Lermontof’s visits.  I don’t think she is too good a friend for you, Diana.  Couldn’t you get some one else to accompany you?”

Diana hesitated.  She would have been quite glad to dispense with Olga’s services had it been possible.  The Russian was for ever hinting at something in connection either with Max or Miss de Gervais; to-day she had but gone a step further than usual.

“Well?” queried Max, reading the doubt in Diana’s eyes.

“I’m afraid I couldn’t engage any one else to accompany me,” she said at last.  “You see, Olga is Baroni’s chosen accompanist, and—­it might make trouble.”

A curious expression crossed his face.

“Yes,” he agreed slowly.  “It might—­make trouble, as you say.  Well, why not ask Joan to stay with you for a time—­to counterbalance matters?”

“Excellent suggestion!” exclaimed Diana, her spirits going up with a bound.  Joan was always so satisfactory and cheerful and commonplace that she felt as though her mere presence in the house would serve to dispel the vague, indefinable atmosphere of suspicion that seemed closing round her.  “I’ll write to her at once.”

“Yes, do.  If she can come next month, she will be here for the first night of ‘Mrs. Fleming’s Husband.’”

Diana went away to write her letter, while Max remained pacing thoughtfully up and down the room, tapping restlessly with his fingers on his chest as he walked.  His face showed signs of fatigue—­the hard work in connection with the production of his play was telling on him—­and since the brief interview with his wife, a new look of anxiety, an alert, startled expression, had dawned in his eyes.