Diana’s indefatigable friend had fair assurances that her book would be noticed before it dropped dead to the public appetite for novelty.  He was anxious next, notwithstanding his admiration of the originality of the conception and the cleverness of the writing, lest the Literary Reviews should fail ‘to do it justice’:  he used the term; for if they wounded her, they would take the pleasure out of success; and he had always present to him that picture of the beloved woman kneeling at the fire-grate at The Crossways, which made the thought of her suffering any wound his personal anguish, so crucially sweet and saintly had her image then been stamped on him.  He bethought him, in consequence, while sitting in the House of Commons; engaged upon the affairs of the nation, and honestly engaged, for he was a vigilant worker—­that the Irish Secretary, Charles Raiser, with whom he stood in amicable relations, had an interest, to the extent of reputed ownership, in the chief of the Literary Reviews.  He saw Raiser on the benches, and marked him to speak for him.  Looking for him shortly afterward, the man was gone.  ’Off to the Opera, if he’s not too late for the drop,’ a neighbour said, smiling queerly, as though he ought to know; and then Redworth recollected current stories of Raiser’s fantastical devotion to the popular prima donna of the angelical voice.—­He hurried to the Opera and met the vomit, and heard in the crushroom how divine she had been that night.  A fellow member of the House, tolerably intimate with Raiser, informed him, between frightful stomachic roulades of her final aria, of the likeliest place where Raiser might be found when the Opera was over:  not at his Club, nor at his chambers:  on one of the bridges—­Westminster, he fancied.

There was no need for Redworth to run hunting the man at so late an hour, but he was drawn on by the similarity in dissimilarity of this devotee of a woman, who could worship her at a distance, and talk of her to everybody.  Not till he beheld Raiser’s tall figure cutting the bridge-parapet, with a star over his shoulder, did he reflect on the views the other might entertain of the nocturnal solicitation to see ‘justice done’ to a lady’s new book in a particular Review, and the absurd outside of the request was immediately smothered by the natural simplicity and pressing necessity of its inside.

He crossed the road and said, ‘Ah?’ in recognition.  ’Were you at the Opera this evening?’

‘Oh, just at the end,’ said Raiser, pacing forward.  ’It’s a fine night.  Did you hear her?’

‘No; too late.’

Raiser pressed ahead, to meditate by himself, as was his wont.  Finding Redworth beside him, he monologuized in his depths:  ’They’ll kill her.  She puts her soul into it, gives her blood.  There ’s no failing of the voice.  You see how it wears her.  She’s doomed.  Half a year’s rest on Como . . . somewhere . . . she might be saved!  She won’t refuse to work.’