Then she raised her eyes, and became conscious that in the dimness of the beautiful theatre something was happening—some work was in progress. As she became accustomed to the gloom she saw that a work-party of those little old women who seem to be inseparable from European opera houses were busy hanging garlands of fresh flowers across the front of the first tier of boxes.

For an instant she felt, stronger than ever before, the mixture of elation and dread which she was learning to recognize as part of her professional life, part of her fate. It was exquisitely delicious and terrifying.

Then, suddenly, from the wings there came a slight draught, and hastily clutching a scarf about her throat she scampered back to the protective warmth of her dressing-room.

When next she stood upon that stage and felt the gentle urging of the rake toward the footlights, she resisted it, not only because she must go nowhere that Richard Jago had not told her to go, but also because she knew by now that crowding the footlights is not the best way for a singer to make herself heard; Domdaniel had given her the valuable tip that stage centre, fifteen or twenty feet from the footlights, is the preferred place on most good operatic stages, and Monica had learned all the polite ways of getting herself to that precise area. For the Association for English Opera was a very polite organization; no shrewishness, no temperament, no bluster marred its rehearsals as sometimes happens among the operatic stars of lesser breeds without the law; nevertheless, there were well-tried English ways of establishing that what was best for the individual singer was also best for the work, for the production, for the balance of the ensemble, and when the position of advantage was Monica’s by right, she had no trouble in getting it. She shared it now with Amyas Palfreyman, the tenor who sang the part of Lucius; Mr Palfreyman was a contradiction of everything that Ludwiga Kressel had said about tenors—that they were all fat, short, the possessors of too-small noses and an excess of female hormones; he was tall, lean, beaky of nose and, if not aggressively masculine, certainly not effeminate; furthermore, he liked Monica and gave her all the help he could without compromising his own role. Monica was very lucky to be making an important early appearance with Mr Palfreyman, and she knew it. Lucky, too, to be under the direction of the great Sir Benedict Domdaniel who, from his place in the pit, kept everything under his control, blending the ensemble of voices and orchestra with immense skill, so that the singers rested upon his conducting as gently and as confidently as gods in a Renaissance picture, resting upon a cloud. Ordinarily the Association for English Opera could not have afforded the services of Sir Benedict; he appeared in Venice, as he had done in London when the opera was first heard, at something like half his ordinary fee, because he wanted to advance the music of Giles Revelstoke.

Oh yes, Monica was very lucky, and she knew it, but during the performance she had no time or inclination to glory in her luck; she was too busy showing fortune that she was worthy of its favours. She had slaved to learn the craft of the opera singer; make-up, classes in posture, hours of toil with the demanding Molloy—she had spared herself nothing. Not only was she able, now, to sound right; she could also look right. She had learned from Giles to be naked before him and to be neither ashamed nor brazen; it was not so very different to appear before a great audience with the same candour. Not that she was naked, though the costume which the designer thought fit for the entrancing servant-enchantress Fotis was a revealing one. “Not every day you get an opera singer who peels well,” the designer had said, “so we may as well make the most of you.” And that was what he had done. The mirror in the long gallery beyond the stage told Monica a pleasing tale. It was amazing, she thought, how well a rather sturdy girl (“strong as a horse”, Sir Benedict had said) could be made to look. Oh, it was good to be as strong as a horse and yet, on a large stage, to look pleasantly fragile!

Domdaniel in the pit was not the only good angel who was watching over her. She moved about the stage in the pattern taught her by Richard Jago. She maintained the mental discipline—the dual consciousness of the actress, which enabled her to give herself to her part, and at the same time to stand a little aside, criticizing, prompting and controlling—which had been so carefully imparted to her by Molloy. And as well as the feat of balance which enabled her to keep all these elements in control she still found a place in her mind for the humility of the interpreter toward the creator, of which Domdaniel had spoken as they drove from Oxford. It was not to the spirit of Bach, long-dead, but to Giles, very much alive and somewhere in the theatre, that she made her offering: would he be pleased?

He certainly should have been pleased, for the opera was very well received. It provided a kind of delight particularly pleasing to an Italian audience, for it gave almost unbroken opportunities for beautiful singing; modern enough in idiom, it was not modern in asperity and rejection of sheer vocal charm; but neither was it sentimental, a succession of musical bon-bons. It was, some of the critics who had descended upon Venice for the Festival said in their dispatches to Germany, to Rome and to Paris, a comic masterpiece—goldenly, sunnily comic, splendid in its acceptance of the ambiguity of man’s aspirations toward both wisdom and joy. Musically it was somewhat novel to Italian ears, for virtually all of its music was either for the ensemble or for the orchestra; but, as the Italian critics pointed out, firmly but kindly, this suited the English voices, which were fine instruments, governed by keen musical intelligence, but not of the highest operatic order. Amyas Palfreyman was generously praised, particularly for his musical braying in Act Two, when he was transformed into an ass; and Monica Gall was mentioned in all the notices as a new singer of great promise, freshness, and uncommon agility and sweetness of voice combined with a lower register which was striking in the scene where she figured as an enchantress.

But these sweets were to be enjoyed later, after the critiques had been collected. The immediate reward was the cheering at the end of the performance, when the cast appeared again and again in front of the curtains; when Sir Benedict appeared with them, and called the orchestra to its feet; when Sir Benedict led Giles Revelstoke forward for the kind of ovation which an audience chiefly Italian gives to a composer who has delighted it.

It was a great evening, marred a little by Giles’ behaviour afterward when Sir Benedict, who liked to keep up certain princely customs, invited the company to have supper with him at the Royal Danieli. The applause had affected Giles adversely, and he was in his morose mood; he would not go, and he took it ill that Monica did want to go. He thought she should have been pleased enough to return with him to their very modest hotel near the Fenice. She felt some concern for him, as he stood apart, scowling at the party as it embarked in gondolas. But when, half an hour later, she was sitting at Sir Benedict’s left hand on the terrace which overlooks the Grand Canal (the place of highest honour, on his right hand, was understandably reserved for Lalage Render, the British première danseuse étoile who danced the role of Psyche in the ballet of Cupid and Psyche which was one of the high points of the opera) she was not troubled about Giles, or about anything. She was perfectly happy, for she knew that she had done well, and (true Canadian that she was) she could enjoy her treat because she had earned it.