r waited a minute or two, she moved and
resumed her former seat, the stray doves flew back to their customary
promenade on the roof, and the drowsy whirr-whirr of the spinning-wheel
murmured again its monotonous hum upon the air.

"Come on, Phil," whispered Lorimer, determined not to be checked this
time; "I feel perfectly wretched! It's mean of us to be skulking about
here, as if we were a couple of low thieves waiting to trap some of
those birds for a pigeon-pie. Come away,--you've seen her; that's
enough."

Errington did not move. Holding back a branch of pine, he watched the
movements of the girl at her wheel with absorbed fascination.

Suddenly her sweet lips parted, and she sang a weird, wild melody, that
seemed, like a running torrent, to have fallen from the crests of the
mountains, bringing with it echoes from the furthest summits, mingled
with soft wailings of a mournful wind.

Her voice was pure as the ring of fine crystal--deep, liquid, and
tender, with a restrained passion in it that stirred Errington's heart
and filled it with a strange unrest and feverish yearning,--emotions
which were new to him, and which, while he realized their existence,
moved him to a sort of ashamed impatience. He would have willingly left
his post of observation now, if only for the sake of shaking off his
unwonted sensations; and he took a step or two backwards for that
purpose, when Lorimer, in his turn, laid a detaining hand on his
shoulder.

"For Heaven's sake, let us hear the song through!" he said in subdued
tones. "What a voice! A positive golden flute!"

His rapt face betokened his enjoyment, and Errington, nothing loth,
still lingered, his eyes fixed on the white-robed slim figure framed in
the dark old rose-wreathed window--the figure that swayed softly with
the motion of the wheel and the rhythm of the song,--while flickering
sunbeams sparkled now and then on the maiden's dusky gold hair, or
touched up a warmer tint on her tenderly flushed cheeks, and fair neck,
more snowy than the gown she wore. Music poured from her lips as from
the throat of a nightingale. The words she sang were Norwegian, and her
listeners understood nothing of them; but the melody,--the pathetic
appealing melody,--soul-moving as all true melody must be, touched the
very core of their hearts, and entangled them in a web of delicious
reveries.

"Talk of Ary Scheffer's Gretchen!" murmured Lorimer with a sigh. "What a
miserable, pasty, milk-a