half-flirting hostilities.

'When I left it, _you_ had not been here,' said he, with an obsequious
tone, and an air of deference only too marked in its courtesy.

A slight, very faint blush on her cheek showed that she rather resented
than accepted the flattery, but she appeared to be occupied in looking
through the music-books, and made no rejoinder.

'We want Mendelssohn, Nina,' said Kate.

'Or at least Spohr,' added Walpole.

'I never accept dictation about what I sing,' muttered Nina, only loud
enough to be overheard by Gorman. 'People don't tell you what theme you are
to talk on; they don't presume to say, "Be serious or be witty." They don't
tell you to come to the aid of their sluggish natures by passion, or to
dispel their dreariness by flights of fancy; and why are they to dare all
this to _us_ who speak through song?'

'Just because you alone can do these things,' said Gorman, in the same low
voice as she had spoken in.

'Can I help you in your search, dearest?' said Kate, coming over to the
piano.

'Might I hope to be of use?' asked Walpole.

'Mr. O'Shea wants me to sing something for _him_,' said Nina coldly. 'What
is it to be?' asked she of Gorman. With the readiness of one who could
respond to any sudden call upon his tact, Gorman at once took up a piece
of music from the mass before him, and said, 'Here is what I have been
searching for.' It was a little Neapolitan ballad, of no peculiar beauty,
but one of those simple melodies in which the rapid transition from deep
feeling to a wild, almost reckless, gaiety imparts all the character.

'Yes, I'll sing that,' said Nina; and almost in the same breath the notes
came floating through the air, slow and sad at first, as though labouring
under some heavy sorrow; the very syllables faltered on her lips like a
grief struggling for utterance--when, just as a thrilling cadence died
slowly away, she burst forth into the wildest and merriest strain,
something so impetuous in gaiety, that the singer seemed to lose all
control of expression, and floated away in sound with every caprice of
enraptured imagination. When in the very whirlwind of this impetuous
gladness, as though a memory of a terrible sorrow had suddenly crossed her,
she ceased; then, in tones of actual agony, her voice rose to a cry of such
utter misery as despair alone could utter. The sounds died slowly away as
though lingeringly. Two bold chords followed, and she was silent.

None spoke i