The door closed between them and a long, long sigh quivered over the lips of the beautiful _prima donna_ with the sorrowful name, _Dolores_. She hid her face in her beautiful hands.
"_His_ poems," she murmured, almost inaudibly. "It will be almost like meeting him face to face. Oh, Ronald, Ronald!"
You would not have thought, to see that slender figure bowed so sorrowfully there, that all New York was raving over her beauty and her genius. But it was true. Madam Dolores, as she called herself, had been induced to come to America by a New York manager who wished to bring out an opera by an author who desired to remain unknown for the present.
It was rumored that the gentleman had already achieved fame as a poet, but beyond that fact, which the manager did not deny, no one even remotely guessed the name. Neither money nor pains had been spared to bring the opera out successfully. Madam Dolores, who had just completed a successful starring tour abroad, was engaged at immense expense to bring it out. The result was--success! Laurels for the brow of the composer, and new laurels for the brow of the singer.
Yet no smile of triumph touched the fair face of the lovely queen of song as she sat there waiting. It was full of a wistful pathos that sometime deepened into pain. It was full of poetry and passion and sorrow. There was no light of gladness in the large and bright dark eyes, yet they were both brave and tender. It was only when she was singing that any brightness came into the grave, sad face.
Then she lost herself like a true _artiste_ in the part she sang.
She looked up quickly as the professor entered with the book for which she had sent him, her white hand trembled as she took the beautiful, richly-bound volume.
"Thank you," she said, and her voice was so husky and low that the professor, her teacher and adviser, looked at her anxiously.
"Dolores, your voice sounds hoarse," he said. "I fear you will not be in voice for to-night."
"Never fear," she replied in a clearer tone, and then she turned away from him, and while he pored over the papers, glorying in the praises they showered on his gifted ward, she sat silent in the great velvet arm-chair with the beautiful volume shut tightly between her folded hands. She was not quite strong enough to open it yet. It seemed like a message from the dead. Ronald Valchester was as one dead to her forever, yet the best part of her lost lover, the heart's deep tenderness, the imperishable, proud, poetic soul seemed throbbing beneath the warm clasp of her hand.