e softer passages of the
overture. Those dull-coloured insects had expended store of hard-earned
_lire_ upon the queer seats they occupied, mounted as upon iron stilts.
They meant to have the whole of that which they had paid for, and hear
every note. If they swarmed, now, swarmed upward, clung along the edges
of those many tiers of boxes, punished inconsiderate insolence with
stings?---It would hardly be unjust.--But there was Powell still, clad
in sober garments. He belonged to the working bees. And Richard became
aware of a singular diffidence and embarrassment in thinking of that.
If they should swarm, those workers, he would rather the valet did not
see it, somehow. He was a good fellow, a faithful servant, a man of
nice feeling, and such an incident would place him in an awkward
position. He ought to be spared that. Carefully Dickie reasoned it all
out.

"You need not stay here any longer, Powell," he said.

"When shall I return, sir?"

The curtain went up. A roll of drums, a chorus of men's voices,
somewhat truculent, in the drinking song.

"At the end of the performance, of course."

But the valet hesitated.

"You might require to send some message, sir."

Richard stared at the chorus. The opera being performed but this once,
economy prevailed. Costumiers had ransacked their stock for discovery
of garments not unpardonably inappropriate. The result showed a fine
superiority to details of time and place. One Spanish bandit, a portly
_basso_, figured in a surprising variety of Highland dress designed,
and that locally, for a chieftain in the opera of _Lucia di
Lammermoor_. His acquaintance with the eccentricities of a kilt being
of the slightest, consequences ensued broadly humorous.--Again Dickie
experienced great amusement. But that message?--Had he really one to
send? Probably he had. He could not remember, and this annoyed him.
Possibly he might remember later. He turned to Powell, forgetting his
amusement, forgetting the too intimate personal revelations of the
unhappy _basso_.

"Yes--well--come back at the end of the second act, then," he said.

If the bees swarmed it would be over by that time, he supposed, so
Powell's return would not matter much one way or the other. A
persuasion of something momentous about to be accomplished deepened in
him. The madness of going, which had so pushed him earlier in the day,
fell dead before it. For this concourse of living creatures must be
gathered together