style="font-size:15px;"> “I must hurry and take Adrian to school,” said she. “Your room is quite ready for you.”
Very well—very well—let there be open war between them! But he was hanged if he’d be the first to make it up again!
He walked up and down his room, and was not calm again until he heard the outer door close upon Adrian and his wife. Of course, if this went on, he would have to make some other arrangement. That was obvious. Tied and bound like this, how could he help the world to escape from life? He opened the piano and looked up his pupils for the morning. Miss Betty Brittle, the Countess Wilkowska and Miss Marian Morrow. They were charming, all three.
Punctually at half-past ten the door-bell rang. He went to the door. Miss Betty Brittle was there, dressed in white, with her music in a blue silk case.
“I’m afraid I’m early,” she said, blushing and shy, and she opened her big blue eyes very wide. “Am I?”
“Not at all, dear lady. I am only too charmed,” said Reginald. “Won’t you come in?”
“It’s such a heavenly morning,” said Miss Brittle. “I walked across the Park. The flowers were too marvellous.”
“Well, think about them while you sing your exercises,” said Reginald, sitting down at the piano. “It will give your voice colour and warmth.”
Oh, what an enchanting idea! What a genius Mr. Peacock was. She parted her pretty lips, and began to sing like a pansy.
“Very good, very good, indeed,” said Reginald, playing chords that would waft a hardened criminal to heaven. “Make the notes round. Don’t be afraid. Linger over them, breathe them like a perfume.”
How pretty she looked, standing there in her white frock, her little blonde head tilted, showing her milky throat.
“Do you ever practise before a glass?” asked Reginald. “You ought to, you know; it makes the lips more flexible. Come over here.”
They went over to the mirror and stood side by side.
“Now sing—moo-e-koo-e-oo-e-a!”
But she broke down, and blushed more brightly than ever.
“Oh,” she cried, “I can’t. It makes me feel so silly. It makes me want to laugh. I do look so absurd!”
“No, you don’t. Don’t be afraid,” said Reginald, but laughed, too, very kindly. “Now, try again!”
The lesson simply flew, and Betty Brittle quite got over her shyness.
“When can I come again?” she asked, tying the music up again in the blue silk case. “I want to take as many lessons as I can just now. Oh, Mr. Peacock, I do enjoy them so much. May I come the day after to-morrow?”
“Dear lady, I shall be only too charmed,” said Reginald, bowing her out.
Glorious girl! And when they had stood in front of the mirror, her white sleeve had just touched his black one. He could feel—yes, he could actually feel a warm glowing spot, and he stroked it. She loved her lessons. His wife came in.
“Reginald, can you let me have some money? I must pay the dairy. And will you be in for dinner to-night?”
“Yes, you know I’m singing at Lord Timbuck’s at half-past nine. Can you make me some clear soup, with an egg in it?”
“Yes. And the money, Reginald. It’s eight and sixpence.”
“Surely that’s very heavy—isn’t it?”
“No, it’s just what it ought to be. And Adrian must have milk.”
There she was—off again. Now she was standing up for Adrian against him.
“I have not the slightest desire to deny my child a proper amount of milk,” said he. “Here is ten shillings.”
The door-bell rang. He went to the door.
“Oh,” said the Countess Wilkowska, “the stairs. I have not a breath.” And she put her hand over her heart as she followed him into the music-room. She was all in black, with a little black hat with a floating veil—violets in her bosom.
“Do not make me sing exercises, to-day,” she cried, throwing out her hands in her delightful foreign way. “No, to-day, I want only to sing songs. . . . And may I take off my violets? They fade so soon.”
“They fade so soon—they fade so soon,” played Reginald on the piano.
“May I put them here?” asked the Countess, dropping them in a little vase that stood in front of one of Reginald’s photographs.
“Dear lady, I should be only too charmed!”
She began to sing, and all was well until she came to the phrase: “You love me. Yes, I know you love me!” Down dropped his hands from the keyboard, he wheeled round, facing her.
“No, no; that’s not good enough. You can do better than that,” cried Reginald ardently. “You must sing as if you were in love. Listen; let me try and show you.” And he sang.
“Oh, yes, yes. I see what you mean,” stammered the little Countess. “May I try it again?”
“Certainly. Do not be afraid. Let yourself go. Confess yourself. Make proud surrender!” he called above the music. And she sang.
“Yes; better that time. But I still feel you are capable of more. Try it with me. There must be a kind of exultant defiance as well—don’t you feel?” And they sang together. Ah! now she was sure she understood. “May I try once again?”
“You love me. Yes, I know you love me.”
The lesson was over before that phrase was quite perfect. The little foreign hands trembled as they put the music together.
“And you are forgetting your violets,” said Reginald softly.
“Yes, I think I will forget them,” said the Countess, biting her underlip. What fascinating ways these foreign women have!
“And you will come to my house on Sunday and make music?” she asked.
“Dear lady, I shall be only too charmed!” said Reginald.
Weep ye no more, sad fountains
Why need ye flow so fast?
sang Miss Marian Morrow, but her eyes filled with tears and her chin trembled.
“Don’t sing just now,” said Reginald. “Let me play it for you.” He played so softly.
“Is there anything the matter?” asked Reginald. “You’re not quite happy this morning.”
No, she wasn’t; she was awfully miserable.
“You don’t care to tell me what it is?”
It
