Page:The Tattooed Countess (1924).pdf/202

 Félia Litvinne in Le Cid, Jean Lassalle in Les Huguenots, Calvé as Ophelia. Clara, who had asked to see these pictures, did not appear to be very much interested in examining them, after all. Crossing her massive ankles, she placed her hands behind her head and leaned back in her chair.

I will be a great singer some day, Gareth greater than any of these. I will sing at the Metropolitan Opera House and you will come to hear me. Just think, she terminated, I go to Chicago in September!

Gareth was not much impressed by this fanfare; he had discovered long since that his interest in people depended entirely on what they had to give him, and assuredly Clara could give him nothing more. He found her misplaced ambition a little vulgar. She had no adaptability; she was stupid; she was smug; she lived in castles constructed of smoke. Melba, Nordica, and Eames meant nothing to her except names of singers who were older than she and consequently were finishing their careers just when she was nearly ready to begin her own.

Gareth. . . Clara's voice was tender.

What is it? His thought took a new turning, reverting to the Countess. How soon, he wondered, could he decently call on her?

Gareth, you're not nice to me any more.

I'm just the same as I always was. Would a week, he questioned himself, be too soon, a week from today? Considering this, he decided that a week would not be too soon.