running all about her, stared at Rose with open mouth. So did
Catherine. Perhaps it was then for the first time that, touched by this
publicity this contagion of other people's feelings, Catherine realized
fully against what a depth of stream she had been building her useless
barriers.

'More! More!' cried Lady Charlotte.

The whole room seconded the demand save the Squire and Mr. Bickerton.
They withdrew together into a distant oriel. Robert, who was delighted
with his little sister-in-law's success, went smiling to talk of it
to Mrs. Darcy, while Catherine with a gentle coldness answered Mr.
Longstaffe's questions on the same theme.

'Shall we?' said Rose, panting a little, but radiant--looking down on
her companion.

'Command me!' he said, his grave lips slightly smiling, his eyes taking
in the same vision that had charmed Lady Charlotte's. What a 'child of
grace and genius!'

'But do you like it?' she persisted.

'Like it--like accompanying your playing?'

'Oh no,'--impatiently; 'showing off, I mean. I am quite ready to stop.'

'Go on; go on!' he said, laying his finger on the A. 'You have driven
all my _mauvaise honte_ away. I have not heard you play so splendidly
yet.'

She flushed all over. 'Then we will go on,' she said briefly.

So they plunged again into an Andante and Scherzo of Beethoven. How the
girl threw herself into it, bringing out the wailing love-song of the
Andante, the dainty tripping mirth of the Scherzo, in a way which
set every nerve in Langham vibrating! Yet the art of it was wholly
unconscious. The music was the mere natural voice of her inmost self.
A comparison full of excitement was going on in that self between her
first impressions of the man beside her, and her consciousness of him,
as he seemed to-night human, sympathetic, kind. A blissful sense of a
mission filled the young silly soul. Like David, she was pitting herself
and her gift against those dark powers which may invade and paralyze a
life.

After the shouts of applause at the end had yielded to a burst of talk,
in the midst of which Lady Charlotte, with exquisite infelicity, might
have been heard laying down the law to Catherine as to how her sister's
remarkable musical powers might be best perfected, Langham turned to his
companion,--

'Do you know that for years I have enjoyed nothing so much as the music
of the last two days?'

His black eyes shone upon her, transfused with something infinitely soft
and frien