‘My dear Mrs. Rolfe,’ said the hostess privately, ’you were simply brilliant!  We are all looking forward so eagerly!’

And as soon as Alma was gone, the amiable lady talked about her to the one remaining guest.

’Isn’t she delightful!  I do so hope she will be a success.  I’m afraid so much depends upon it.  Of course, you know that she is the daughter of Bennet Frothingham?  Didn’t you know?  Yes, and left without a farthing.  I suppose it was natural she should catch at an offer of marriage, poor girl, but it seems to have been most ill-advised.  One never sees her husband, and I’m afraid he is anything but kind to her.  He may have calculated on her chances as a musician.  I am told they have little or nothing to depend upon.  Do drum up your friends —­ will you?  It is to be at Prince’s Hall, on May the 16th —­ I think.  I feel, don’t you know, personally responsible; she would never have come out but for my persuasion, and I’m so anxious for a success!’

The day drew near for Ada Wellington’s debut.  Alma met this young lady, but they did not take to each other; Miss Wellington was a trifle ‘loud’, and, unless Alma mistook, felt fiercely jealous of any one admired by Felix Dymes.  As she could not entertain at their own house (somewhere not far south of the Thames), Mrs. Wellington borrowed Dymes’s flat for an afternoon, and there, supported by the distinguished composer, received a strange medley of people who interested themselves in her daughter’s venture.  Alma laughed at the arrangement, and asked Dymes if he expected her congratulations.

‘Don’t make fun of them,’ said Felix.  ’Of course, they’re not your sort, Alma.  But I’ve known them all my life, and old Wellington did me more than one good turn when I was a youngster.  Ada won’t make much of it, but she’ll squeeze in among the provincial pros after this send off.’

‘You really are capable of generosity?’ asked Alma.

’I swear there’s nothing between us.  There’s only one woman living that I have eyes for —­ and I’m afraid she doesn’t care a rap about me; at all events, she treats me rather badly.’

This dialogue took place in a drawing-room the evening before Miss Wellington’s day.  Alma had declined to meet her agent a second time at the Apollo Theatre; they saw each other, by arrangement, at this and that house of common friends, and corresponded freely by post, Dymes’s letters always being couched in irreproachable phrase.  Whenever the thing was possible, he undisguisedly made love, and Alma bore with it for the sake of his services.  He had obtained promises from four musicians of repute to take part in Alma’s concert, and declared that the terms they asked were lower than usual, owing to their regard for him.  The expenses of the recital, without allowing for advertisements, would amount to seventy or eighty pounds; and Dymes guaranteed that the hall should produce at least that.  Alma, ashamed to appear uneasy about such paltry sums, always talked as though outlay mattered nothing.