Opera. All this excitement, this world of perfume, of flowers, of
exquisite costumes, of beautiful women, of fine, brave men. She
looked back with immense pity to the narrow little life of her
native town she had just left forever, the restricted horizon, the
petty round of petty duties, the rare and barren pleasures--the
library, the festival, the few concerts, the trivial plays. How easy
it was to be good and noble when music such as this had become a
part of one's life; how desirable was wealth when it could make
possible such exquisite happiness as hers of the moment. Nobility,
purity, courage, sacrifice seemed much more worth while now than a
few moments ago. All things not positively unworthy became heroic,
all things and all men. Landry Court was a young chevalier, pure as
Galahad. Corthell was a beautiful artist-priest of the early
Renaissance. Even Jadwin was a merchant prince, a great financial
captain. And she herself--ah, she did not know; she dreamed of
another Laura, a better, gentler, more beautiful Laura, whom
everybody, everybody loved dearly and tenderly, and who loved
everybody, and who should die beautifully, gently, in some garden
far away--die because of a great love--beautifully, gently in the
midst of flowers, die of a broken heart, and all the world should be
sorry for her, and would weep over her when they found her dead and
beautiful in her garden, amid the flowers and the birds, in some
far-off place, where it was always early morning and where there was
soft music. And she was so sorry for herself, and so hurt with the
sheer strength of her longing to be good and true, and noble and
womanly, that as she sat in the front of the Cresslers' box on that
marvellous evening, the tears ran down her cheeks again and again,
and dropped upon her tight-shut, white-gloved fingers.

But the contralto had disappeared, and in her place the tenor held