the distant mountains. He
seemed incapable of fixing his mind upon the task to which he attached so
much importance. Several times, Mrs. Taine called, but he begged her to be
patient; and she, with pretended awe of the moods of genius, waited.

Conrad Lagrange jeered and mocked, offered sneering advice or sarcastic
compliment; and, under it all, was keenly watchful and sympathetic--
understanding better than the artist himself, perhaps, the secret of the
painter's hesitation. Every day,--sometimes in the morning, sometimes in
the afternoon or evening unseen musician, in the orange grove wrought
for them melodie that, whether grave or gay, always carried, somehow,
the feeling that had so moved them in the mysterious darkness of
that first evening.

They knew, now, of course, that the musician lived in the neighboring
house--the gable and chimney of which was just visible above the
orange-trees. But that was all. Obedient to some whimsical impulse that
prompted them both, and was born, no doubt, of the circumstance and mood
of that first evening, they did not seek to learn more. They
feared--though they did not say it--that to learn the identity of the
musician would rob them of the peculiar pleasure they found in the music,
itself. So they spoke always of their unknown neighbor in a fanciful vein,
as in like humor they spoke of the spirit that Aaron King still insisted
haunted the place, or as they alluded to the mystery of the carefully
tended rose garden.

When the artist could put it off no longer, a day was finally set when
Mrs. Taine was to come for the beginning of her portrait. The appointed
hour found the artist in his studio. A canvas stood ready upon the easel;
palette, colors and brushes were at hand. The painter was standing at the
big, north window, looking up away to the mountains--the mountains that
the novelist said called so insistently. Suddenly, he turned his head to
listen. Sweetly clear and low, through the green wall of the orange-trees,
came the music of that hidden violin.

As he stood there,--with his eyes fixed upon the mountains, listening to
the spirit that spoke in the tones of the unseen instrument,--Aaron King
knew, all at once, that the passing moment was one of those rare
moments--that come, all unexpectedly--when, with prophetic vision, one
sees clearly the end of the course he pursues and the destiny that waits
him at its completion. As clearly, too, he saw the other way, and knew t