Diana, whose attention had been claimed by the Rector, had not caught the quickly spoken sentences which had passed between the two, but she was puzzled over the oddly yearning look she had surprised in Olga’s eyes.  There had been a tenderness, a species of wistful longing in her gaze, as she had turned towards Max Errington, which tallied ill with the bitter incisiveness of the remarks she let fall at times concerning him.

“Well, my dear”—­the Rector’s voice recalled Diana’s wandering thoughts—­“Joan and I must be getting back to our hotel, if we are to be dressed in time for the dinner Miss de Gervais is giving in your honour to-night.”

Diana glanced at the clock and nodded.

“Indeed you must, Pobs darling.  And I will send away these other good people too.  As we’re all going to meet again at dinner we can bear to be separated for an hour or so—­even Jerry and Joan, I suppose?” she added whimsically, in a lower tone.

“It’s invidious to mention names,” murmured Stair, “or I might—­”

Diana laid her hand lightly across his mouth.

“No, you mightn’t,” she said firmly.  “Put on your coat and that nice squashy hat of yours, and trot back to your hotel like a good Pobs.”

Stair laughed, looking down at her with kind eyes.

“Very well, little autocrat.”  He put his hand under her chin and tilted her face up.  “I’ve not congratulated you yet, my dear.  It’s a big thing you’ve done—­captured London in a day.  But it’s a bigger thing you’ll have to do.”

“You mean Paris—­Vienna?”

He shook his head, still with the kind smile in his eyes.

“No.  I mean, keep me the little Diana I love—­don’t let me lose her in the public singer.”

“Oh, Pobs!”—­reproachfully.  “As though I should ever change!”

“Not deliberately—­not willingly, I’m sure.  But—­success is a difficult sea to swim.”

He sighed, kissed her upturned face, and then, with twist of his shoulders, pulled on his overcoat and prepared to depart.

Success is exhilarating.  It goes to the head like wine, and yet, as Diana lay in bed that night, staring with wide eyes into the darkness, the memory that stood out in vivid relief from amongst the crowded events of the day was not the triumph of the afternoon, nor the merry evening which succeeded it, when “the coming prima donna” had been toasted amid a fusillade of brilliant little speeches and light-hearted laughter, but the remembrance of a pair of passionate, demanding blue eyes and of a low, tense voice saying:—­

“I swear I won’t fail you.  Let me ‘stand by.’”

CHAPTER XIV

THE FLAME OF LOVE