Part 19 (2/2)

'There's something rather appropriate about your playing Amba.s.sadress here,' observed Logotheti.

Margaret heard but did not understand that her new acquaintance was a Russian subject. Mustapha Pasha held out his arm to take her in to dinner. The spectacled peer took in Lady Maud, and the men straggled in. At table Lady Maud sat opposite the Pasha, with the peer on her right and the barrister on her left. Margaret was on the right of the Amba.s.sador, on whose other side Griggs was placed, and Logotheti was Margaret's other neighbour. Feist and the young playwright were together, between Griggs and the n.o.bleman.

Margaret glanced round the table at the people and wondered about them. She had heard of the barrister and the novelist, and the peer's name had a familiar sound that suggested something unusual, though she could not quite remember what it was. It might be pictures, or the north pole, or the divorce court, or a new idiot asylum; it would never matter much. The new acquaintances on whom her attention fixed itself were Lady Maud, who attracted her strongly, and Mr. Feist, who repelled her. She wished she could speak Greek in order to ask Logotheti who the latter was and why he was present. To judge by appearances he was probably a rich young American who travelled and frequented theatres a good deal, and who wished to be able to say that he knew Cordova. He had perhaps arrived lately with a letter of introduction to the Amba.s.sador, who had asked him to the first nondescript informal dinner he gave, because the man would not have fitted in anywhere else.

Logotheti began to talk at once, while Mustapha Pasha plunged into a political conversation with Griggs.

'I'm much more glad to see you than you can imagine,' the Greek said, not in an undertone, but just so softly that no one else could hear him.

'I'm not good at imagining,' answered Margaret. 'But I'm glad you are here. There are so many new faces.'

'Happily you are not shy. One of your most enviable qualities is your self-possession.'

'You're not lacking in that way either,' laughed Margaret. 'Unless you have changed very much.'

'Neither of us has changed much since last year. I only wish you would!'

Margaret turned her head to look at him.

'So you think I am not changed!' she said, with a little pleased surprise in her tone.

'Not a bit. If anything, you have grown younger in the last two years.'

'Does that mean more youthful? More frisky? I hope not!'

'No, not at all. What I see is the natural effect of vast success on a very, nice woman. Formerly, even after you had begun your career, you had some doubts as to the ultimate result. The future made you restless, and sometimes disturbed the peace of your face a little, when you thought about it too much. That's all gone now, and you are your real self, as nature meant you to be.'

'My real self? You mean, the professional singer!'

'No. A great artist, in the person of a thoroughly nice woman.'

Margaret had thought that blus.h.i.+ng was a thing of the past with her, but a soft colour rose in her cheeks now, from sheer pleasure at what he had said.

'I hope you don't think it impertinent of me to tell you so,' said Logotheti with a slight intonation of anxiety.

'Impertinent!' cried Margaret. 'It's the nicest thing any one has said to me for months, and thank goodness I'm not above being pleased.'

Nor was Logotheti above using any art that could please her. His instinct about women, finding no scruples in the way, had led him into present favour by the shortest road. It is one thing to say brutally that all women like flattery; it is quite another to foresee just what form of flattery they will like. People who do not know professional artistic life from the inner side are much too ready to cry out that first-cla.s.s professionals will swallow any amount of undiscriminating praise. The ability to judge their own work is one of the gifts which place them above the second cla.s.s.

'I said what I thought,' observed Logotheti with a sudden air of conscientious reserve. 'For once in our acquaintance, I was not thinking of pleasing you. And then I was afraid that I had displeased you, as I so often have.'

The last words were spoken with a regret that was real.

'I have forgiven you,' said Margaret quietly; 'with conditions!' she added, as an afterthought, and smiling.

'Oh, I know--I'll never do it again.'

'That's what a runaway horse seems to say when he walks quietly home, with his head down and his ears limp, after nearly breaking one's neck!'

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