, the
first low muttering of impending woe. Gradually the simple melody
began to lose itself in a chaos of calamity, bent and swayed by wailing
minor cadences through whose torrent of hurrying sound it could be
heard vainly and fitfully trying to assert itself again, only to be at
last weighed down, crushed out, by a cataclysm of despairing chords.
Then, after a long, pregnant pause--the culminating silence of
defeat--the original melody stole out once more, repeated in a minor
key, hollow and denuded.

As the music ceased the lights sprang up again and Nan, looking across
the room, met Mallory's gaze intently bent upon her. In his expression
she could discern that by a queer gift of intuition he had comprehended
the whole inner meaning of what she had been playing. Most people
would have thought that it was a magnificent bit of composition,
particularly for so young a musician, but Mallory went deeper and knew
it to be a wonderful piece of self-revelation--the fruit of a spirit
sorely buffeted.

Almost instantaneously Nan realised that he had understood, and she was
conscious of a fierce resentment. She felt as though an unwarrantable
intrusion had been made upon her privacy, and her annoyance showed
itself in the quick compression of her mouth. She was about to slip
away under cover of the applause when Mallory laid a detaining hand
upon her arm.

"Don't go," he said. "And forgive me for understanding!"

Nan, sorely against her will, looked, up and met his eyes--eyes that
were irresistibly kind and friendly. She hesitated, still anxious to
escape.

"Please," he begged. "Don't leave me"--his lips endeavouring not to
smile--"in high dudgeon. It's always seemed such an awful thing to be
left in--like boiling oil."

Suddenly she yielded to the man's whimsical charm and sank down again
into her chair.

"That's better." He smiled and seated himself beside her. "I couldn't
help it, you know," he said quaintly. "It was you yourself who told
me."

"Told you what?"

"That the world hadn't been quite kind."

Nan felt a sudden reckless instinct to tempt fate. There was already a
breach in her privacy; for this one evening she did not care if the
wall were wholly battered down.

"Tell me," she queried with averted head, "how--how much did you
understand?"

Mallory scrutinised her reflectively.

"You really wish it?"

"Yes, really."

He was silent a moment. Then he spoke slowly, as though choosi