and boy-hood, and to change what she had
considered a childish joke into romantic earnest. Rose had very serious
ideas of love and had no intention of being beguiled into even a
flirtation with her handsome cousin.

So Charlie attitudinized unnoticed and was getting rather out of temper
when Phebe began to sing, and he forgot all about himself in admiration
of her. It took everyone by surprise, for two years of foreign training
added to several at home had worked wonders, and the beautiful voice
that used to warble cheerily over pots and kettles now rang out
melodiously or melted to a mellow music that woke a sympathetic thrill
in those who listened. Rose glowed with pride as she accompanied her
friend, for Phebe was in her own world now a lovely world where no
depressing memory of poorhouse or kitchen, ignorance or loneliness, came
to trouble her, a happy world where she could be herself and rule others
by the magic of her sweet gift.

Yes, Phebe was herself now, and showed it in the change that came over
her at the first note of music. No longer shy and silent, no longer the
image of a handsome girl but a blooming woman, alive and full of the
eloquence her art gave her, as she laid her hands softly together,
fixed her eye on the light, and just poured out her song as simply and
joyfully as the lark does soaring toward the sun.

"My faith, Alec that's the sort of voice that wins a man's heart out
of his breast!" exclaimed Uncle Mac, wiping his eyes after one of the
plaintive ballads that never grow old.

"So it would!" answered Dr. Alec delightedly.

"So it has," added Archie to himself; and he was right, for just at that
moment he fell in love with Phebe. He actually did, and could fix the
time almost to a second, for at a quarter past nine, he merely thought
her a very charming young person; at twenty minutes past, he considered
her the loveliest woman he ever beheld; at five and twenty minutes past,
she was an angel singing his soul away; and at half after nine he was
a lost man, floating over a delicious sea to that temporary heaven on
earth where lovers usually land after the first rapturous plunge.

If anyone had mentioned this astonishing fact, nobody would have
believed it; nevertheless, it was quite true, and sober, businesslike
Archie suddenly discovered a fund of romance at the bottom of his
hitherto well-conducted heart that amazed him. He was not quite clear
what had happened to him at first, and sat