The sea, the wind, the call of birds,
The leaves that whisper, brooks that run,
No song is ever void of words,
To hearts that beat as one.
Sir Robert and Lady Seton were passing through Paris on their way to
join the _Phyllis_ in Mediterranean waters. They intended to cruise
along the African coast, putting in a few days at Algiers, a week or
so in Alexandria, and then go on to the Bosphorus, which possessed
the charm of mirroring on its gracious bosom the minaretted city
where a first cousin of “Uncle Bob” was representing his country at
the Padishah’s Court.
The middle-aged couple were for the time being at the Meurice,
occupying a suite of rooms replete with every comfort, and were at
that very minute enjoying a thoroughly English breakfast in their
sunny private dining-room. No such kickshaws for Uncle Bob as foamy
chocolate and golden-coated rolls light as muslin, but soles fried in
torment, with an accompaniment of oysters, truffles, mussels, and a
seasoning of white wine; a portentous steak, humpbacked and juicy--as
every self-respecting beefsteak should be--an omelette rouged into
the semblance of a modern beauty by its filling of tomatoes, not to
mention several other odorous trifles in the shape of grilled
sardines and deviled kidneys.
Lady Seton was already armored from head to foot in well-cut
serviceable tweeds, similar in texture and color to those
which adorned her lord’s portly form. She believed in frilly
dressing-gowns and coquettish morning coiffures no more than did Sir
Robert in over-dainty breakfasts. Solidity, in costly disguise, was
what they both preferred.
Ensconced behind the pages of the _London Times_, Sir Robert was
seated squarely before his well-filled plate, and while perusing the
news of two days before with the greatest interest, methodically
carried his fork to his mouth, and back again for fresh supplies. His
wife, without sparing herself a bite, was getting through a pile of
letters just arrived, leaning each one in turn against the toast-rack
as she read, while “Lady Hamilton”--a sadly obese toy spaniel, and
her mistress’s darling pet--sat gravely on a cushioned chair beside
her, gloating with all her large, moist eyes over a near-by dish of
cake.
“The Prime Minister,” Sir Robert remarked, in an aggrieved tone, “has
put his veto upon the interference of Great Britain in--” He glanced
round the edge of the paper, noticed his wife’s total inattention,
murmured to himself something concerning feminine frivolity, followed
by a grumbled conjecture as to whether the Premier realized that he
was a public servant, or imagined himself the autocrat of all the
Englands, and finally relapsed into ominous silence.
Just then a servant, so prehistorically dignified as to suggest the
Stone Age, moved noiselessly from the door to Sir Robert’s elbow,
where he stood like a statue, disdainful of employing the typical
“cough-behind-the-hand” manner of disclosing his presence, until the
shadow of his admirably nourished body falling athwart the sacred
pages of the _Times_ did this for him.
“What is it, Berkley?” Sir Robert asked, testily; he abhorred being
disturbed at breakfast. “Has anything gone wrong?”
“No, Sir Robert--that is, yes, in a way, Sir Robert; there is
a--er--gentleman to see you, Sir Robert, in the reception-room.”
“A gentleman to see me in the reception-room at eleven o’clock!”
Sir Robert exclaimed. “Did he send up a card?”
“No, Sir Robert, leastways not that I know of. The chassewer
down-stairs”--Berkley was no French scholar--“sent up the name only,
by the page.”
“Well--confound it!--what is the name?”
“Mr. Preston Wynne,” Berkley stated.
“Young Wynne! God bless my soul! Why didn’t you say so at first?
Show him up immediately, Berkley. Why, you’ve seen him fifty times
at Seton Park. Show him up--of course if you don’t mind, my dear,”
he concluded, addressing his wife, who nodded consent without
discontinuing her reading.
In a moment Mr. Preston Wynne was warmly shaking hands with Sir
Robert, after which he reverently touched the extended tips of Lady
Seton’s fingers, bowed, and accepted a chair facing the one where
“Lady Hamilton” was now enjoying the audible slumber of the
corpulent.
“I hope I am not too early,” he said, beamingly. “You know I wanted
to catch you before you left the hotel for your constitutional, Sir
Robert. I remember your habits, you see!”
“Not a bit too early, my dear boy,” Sir Robert said, with unwonted
geniality. “I did not know you were in Paris, though. When did you
arrive?”
“Oh, a week ago or thereabouts. Grandma Wynne was set on being here
for Ethel’s wedding, and so I brought her over. She’s the most
indefatigable old lady in Christendom!” he concluded, with a laugh
that revealed a double row of strong white teeth as regular as if
they had been carved by machinery.
He was what Aunt Elizabeth called “a very personable youth,” was this
well-bred transatlantic, not very tall--say five foot nine--but well
built, well groomed, well dressed, and with a pair of keen,
gray-green eyes, and a sleek head of pleasingly red-brown hair.
Moreover, being the only son of a many-sided father, who had added
greatly to a vast inherited fortune by old-fashioned and
unexceptionable means, he was of some weight in the cosmopolitan
world of the day, amid which he moved at ease and with a delightful
buoyancy. He had met the Setons at Villefranche a couple of
seasons earlier, and, extraordinary to record, had found such
favor in Aunt Elizabeth’s eyes that an invitation to shoot at
Seton Park had followed. It was there that he had met and fallen
in love with Laurence, to whom he had proposed. That young lady,
dazzled by his wealth, his prospects, his father’s magnificent
steam-yacht--anchored at the time in the Solent--and perhaps
attracted also by the young man’s inexhaustible good temper and
humorous aplomb, had been on the point of accepting him. Her
infatuation for Neville Moray had, however, stayed her on the brink
of a very desirable union. But she had, nevertheless, left him
sufficient hope for the future to make the announcement of her
marriage to Basil a very great surprise indeed. In spite of this he
did not seem particularly broken-hearted this morning, as he sat in
the full light of the windows smoking one of Sir Robert’s best
smuggled cigarettes. Lady Seton had retired to put on her hat, and
the two men were alone.
“Have you already seen my niece?” asked Sir Robert, who (it may as
well be admitted at once) could never face a situation of any
awkwardness without immediately feeling called upon to put both his
large, well-shaped feet through and through it.
“Yes, at a distance,” Wynne replied, blowing three successive rings
of blue smoke in front of him, and with such dexterity that they
interlocked and floated away amiably linked to one another.
“The day after my arrival I saw her driving in the Bois wrapped to
the eyes in amazing sables, and behind a pair of Orloffs that made
my mouth water, I assure you. Two nights later I glimpsed her at the
opera wearing a diadem and triple necklace of rubies and diamonds fit
for an empress. But in neither case did she appear to recognize my
humble personality.”
Sir Robert shook his head gloomily. “I am afraid,” he remarked, “that
she is having her brain turned by the adulation with which she is
surfeited. Personally, I wish she had married you instead of Prince
Palitzin, although I am bound to state that he is a fine man, and has
behaved toward her with the utmost generosity.”
Preston Wynne half rose, put his hand on his heart, and bowed with
gay appreciation of the compliment.
“I am,” he pronounced, “flattered indeed that you should have been
inclined to prefer me to one of Europe’s greatest personages. But,
frankly, I cannot understand why you ever did such a thing.”
Sir Robert smiled. He possessed, alas! no sense of humor whatsoever,
but somehow or other he liked what he termed the quaint ways of this
youthful friend.
“Laurence,” he proceeded to expound, “is a curious girl. Not English
in the least. Of course you know that we are one of those Catholic
families who have never given up the ‘Old Faith,’ but that has
nothing to do with it. Our blood is British--just so--and where that
child has fished her very peculiar characteristics from is more than
I can explain. At any rate, she was never quite one of us--as I
frequently tell her aunt--a regrettable circumstance. She might have
made _you_ a good wife. You are a sensible chap, you see, who would
stand no nonsense, I’m sure. But Prince Basil is quite another
affair. He belongs to that class of foreign nobles whom we cannot
help but admire, insular though we may be, but who should decidedly
wed their own women; admirable creatures; trained to suit them and
the high position they occupy. Between you and me, my dear fellow,
the feminine portion of our Anglo-Saxon race is rapidly becoming too
emancipated, too free and easy, too assured of what they are pleased
to call their rights--an attitude, let me add, which will gradually
lead to the disclassing of the higher orders. It has already begun to
do so, and soon the British great lady of old will have totally
disappeared. Indeed, we have examples....”
“_Mais où sont les neiges d’antan!_” the American quoted to
himself, continuing to follow his host’s arguments with a profound
and most flattering solemnity of aspect.
“Examples,” Sir Robert continued, “which have shown us that blue
blood no longer counts for much; that, in short, coronets,
time-honored and valiantly won in the glorious past, can be doffed in
favor of the red cap of revolution,--sported on the tail of a cart,
whence their fair wearers shriek themselves hoarse in the unwashed
cause of Socialism.”
Mr. Wynne, still listening politely, was beginning to wonder where
Sir Robert was heading.
“Yes,” he put in, dubiously--“yes, of course you are entirely right,
but your niece is scarcely of the kind you refer to, and she will
without the possibility of a doubt grace the high estate in which she
now finds herself. She very naturally preferred becoming a
Serene-Highness to being plain Mrs. Wynne of Nowhere in particular;
and who can blame her? She was born to the purple; one can see it at
a glance.”
Sir Robert rose, walked over to the fire, planted himself on the rug,
and, with both hands under his coat-tails, surveyed the speaker.
“I’m glad to see you take it like that!” he stated, thinking within
himself of Neville Moray’s visible melancholy when he had met him
at a levee some two weeks after Laurence’s wedding. “There’s
never any use,” he resumed, “in crying over derailed love-affairs,
and this being so, I wish you’d come and dine with us here
to-night. You’ll meet the Palitzins and some Breton friends of
Laurence’s, the Marquis and Mademoiselle de Plenhöel. They are
near relatives of Prince Basil, and it was at their château in
Brittany that Laurence first met her husband.”
Wynne rose and drew on his left glove before answering. He wanted
just that infinitesimal space of time to make up his mind, and when
he had accomplished this task the trick was done.
“Thank you very much, Sir Robert. I’ll come with pleasure if
you’ll let me,” he said, smiling. “Good morning, Lady Seton. I’m
off!” he added as, turning, he found himself face to face with her
fur-wrapped figure. “Sir Robert has been good enough to invite me for
to-night, and so, as the saying is over here, ‘_Au plaisir, madame,
de vous revoir_.’”
He was gone, and in all the majesty of her matronly disapproval Lady
Seton bore down upon her husband.
“I am amazed at you, Robert, really amazed! What could induce you to
invite that poor young man with Laurence and Basil? I trust you may
have thought of asking Captain Moray to be here also. It would really
insure the success of the party!” she concluded, sarcastically.
Sir Robert’s Olympian brow reddened--his brow always became
Olympian the moment his wife appeared upon the scene.
“You are wholly correct,” he said, stiffly, “for that is exactly what
I have done!”
Lady Seton raised her muff toward heaven--a painted one, with a Greek
key pattern and cupids disporting themselves among roses in merry
French fashion--let the muff sink to the level of her somewhat flat
waist, and sat abruptly down on “Lady Hamilton,” who awoke with a
smothered groan of surprise and pain.
“My Heaven! What have I done?” shrieked the lady, getting on her
feet again with surprising agility. “Oh, my poor, poor lovey!” she
moaned, hugging the fat, wheezing little dog to her fur bosom. “Oh!
Oh! Oh!”
“Stop that nonsense, Elizabeth!” Sir Robert, more Olympian than ever,
reproved her. “You couldn’t hurt the brute if you tried. Why,
she’s like a feather pillow--most unsportsmanlike to overfeed her
as you do. And now please attend to me,” he continued, austerely,
easing with a square-toed finger the uncompromisingly angular collar
around his neck. “I asked Moray, as I told you, and now I’ve asked
Wynne to dine--that’s an accomplished fact. But what I wish to
impress upon you is that, Princess or no Princess, I don’t propose
to be made to feel like a child in my own house.” He cast a masterful
look at the topsy-turvy cupids gamboling above his head, but did not
trouble to smile at the idea of having claimed them and the attached
hostelry as his own. “If Laurence has so little tact and monde as to
be annoyed because she meets her old flames at our table, let her be
annoyed; I don’t care a fig about it. So that’s clear, is it
not?”
He set his foot with an air of extreme finality upon the hearth-rug,
volte-faced, and strode to the door to meet his hat, coat, and cane
in the hands of the rigid Berkley; leaving his wife, in one of her
most acid moods, to follow behind.
The dinner-table that night was set with all the luxury that money
can suggest to French taste, and it was difficult to realize that the
silver and crystal, the porcelain and flowers, had not been
preordained and arranged by the especial orders of a distinguished
hostess. As Sir Robert said, condescendingly, “They manage these
things very well in Paris.” Contrary to what Lady Seton had
anticipated, a cheerful merriment held the guests from the moment
they sat down, and soon the conversation--never failing in genial
humor--actually rose to the higher level of wit. This was due chiefly
to Basil and to young Wynne, who seemed--much to Laurence’s
annoyance and surprise--to hit it off from the first. Lady Seton,
usually what her husband described as a “damper,” became as nearly
responsive to the pleasing atmosphere of the occasion as was possible
for her to be, while Sir Robert, to everybody’s astonishment,
plunged headlong--after the fish--into excellent yachting anecdotes.
Tubbed and razored, and shedding cheerful waves of bay-rum and hair
tonic about him, his ample shirt-front embellished by two large
pearls gleaming like moons through mist, he expanded more and more as
the well-conceived menu fulfilled its alluring promises, and cast
glances of roseate satisfaction around the board. “Elizabeth is a
fool!” he commented, inwardly. “They’re all enjoying themselves like
periwinkles at high tide.... By the way, she’s got herself up to his
Majesty’s taste, has Elizabeth. She’s positively scratched five
years off her age.” And so she had. For on occasions of ceremony, in
spite of her Galliphobe tendencies, Lady Seton knew not only how to
buy, but how to wear a Parisian gown of the best Place Vendome make,
besides which her neck and arms were still more than presentable,
and her jewels magnificent. Had there possibly lurked in her mind
a desire to eclipse Laurence’s bridal splendors? But who is to gauge
the possibilities of a feminine brain, old or young? At any rate,
to quote Sir Robert, as far as “get up” went, she was easily ahead
of her niece by several lengths; for the faint pink of the bride’s
crêpe-de-Chine, looped up with natural Bengal roses, was of Basil’s
selection, and therefore its exquisite simplicity paled before her
aunt’s gold-laminated brocades and zibline-bordered train.
Marguerite--who never cared much for what she wore--was, as usual, in
white, something soft and clinging, with an almost imperceptible
current of pearl and silver embroidery frosting its graceful folds;
on the left shoulder a cluster of her namesake flowers, fastened by
an antique silver Breton heart-and-crown, and about her throat on a
slender silver thread a silver fleur-de-lys.
So “young girlish”--_si délicieusement jeune fille!_ Basil had
thought, as he had glanced furtively at her on her arrival. Now he
did not dare to let his eyes wander in her direction, remembering the
scene with Laurence only too well. Marguerite was placed diagonally
opposite to him--the place of honor was occupied by the British
Ambassadress, a handsome woman of fifty or so, whose blond bandeaux
retained the silky brilliance that had caused her for many years to
be known to her friends by the charming nickname of “_Rose
d’or_,”--and above the yellow and lilac orchids of the surtout he
trusted himself only to watch the “Gamin’s” strong little hands,
playing with her knife and fork as though she were attending a
schoolroom _dinette_ instead of one of her first formal
dinner-parties.
Beside her sat Neville Moray, a trifle too silent and contemplative,
but still smiling amiably, and Preston Wynne, from his place by the
Ambassadress, caught and passed the ball of gay chatter with Basil
and “Antinoüs,” his next neighbor. Both were highly amused by his
sallies as he related to them a recent trip to Sonora, where the
elder Wynne owned a beautiful hacienda. Mexican _haut-faits_ were
related in vividly picturesque language, dotted now and again with
Spanish names and expletives of a gracious canority, while when the
narrator dropped into plain United States his discourse became
variegated with cowboy vernacular that brought tears of laughter to
all eyes.
“We’re a queer lot, aren’t we?” Wynne was saying. “A regular
hodgepodge, _believe me_! You’ve got to sift the sheep from the
goats if you want to have a good time, though I am bound to say that
the sheep are not, by a long shot, the most amusing of the
two--except when they are mountain-sheep with a lot of kick in them!
As to the Dons, they are not half bad, keen as mustard, plucky as
they make ’em, and with no genuine harm in them if one knows how to
handle the breed. Give me a revoluting Mexican first, next, and
always, in preference to some of our hand-raised products, made in
Germany, for instance.”
“You have a lot of Germans out there, haven’t you? So have we in
Russia, alas!” Basil interposed with a wry smile.
“Yes, Germans are Germans,” Wynne replied. “We don’t cotton to
’em much, but when fresh off the farm they are all right enough in
their way. It’s the Germo-American I object to. He who is either
born in America, or imported at little cost and so tender an age that
he mistakes himself for one of us. We have specimens worth the price
of admission, just for the privilege of ogling them. There’s one
peacherino I especially admire--a big bug, too, you bet! He came over
when he was a little shaver, and began his industrial career as a
sausage-peddler out West. He knew a thing or two, though, and little
by little he came to own a butcher shop, then two, then three--like
the boy who started in by selling sand to grocers to put in the
sugar--and ended in a lake-shore palace and the smartest set. Well,
this ambitious butcher I’m speaking of finally went into the cattle
business--wholesale, on the hoof, and all that, you know--until,
having made a pile as high as Chimborazo, he housed his family in
marble halls and let madame and her young uns have their fling.
Nothing was too good for them--an art-gallery filled with
masterpieces, a music-room where the most expensive musicanders were
heard. Plush liveries placarded with fine gold for the servants--we
don’t say help any more, even out West; we’ve found out the
fallacy of it--motor-cars from France, a steam-yacht on the
lake--they refuse themselves nothing, and their only shame is that
old German father of the whole shooting-match, who has not risen
with his fortunes! He is a holy show, it’s a fact, slouching about
in an aged overcoat and a shabby soft hat, up at five every morning
and sneaking out of his castle to do what? Bet you’d never guess!
Why, just as a matter of habit to go to the stock-yards and with his
own hands slaughter a hog. It has become second nature to him, and he
swears it gives him an appetite for breakfast.”
Sir Robert, who had been neglecting his charming neighbors, burst
into a roar of laughter.
“To kill a hog! To kill a ...” he choked, crimson with appreciation.
“Marble halls, hogs--help!” he gurgled on. “You are a queer chap,
Wynne! I like you!”
“So do I, Sir Robert,” was the prompt reply. “I was afraid my little
story might have shocked everybody.”
“Nonsense,” the Baronet protested. “Give us some more of your
experiences, do! You take life as it should be taken--on its jolly
side. It’s the right way.”
Laurence’s hazel eyes fixed themselves reproachfully upon her
uncle. _She_ did not feel inclined to praise Preston Wynne’s
gaiety. A man jilted by her should have displayed a fitter regret for
what he had lost, and, seeking consolation, she turned toward
Neville, who, at least, knew what was due her better than to laugh
and joke; but, lo and behold, this distinguished young officer was
deep in conversation with Marguerite, who looked exasperatingly
pretty. There was Basil, too--her own wedded husband--talking and
enjoying himself just as if she had never made him a scene and tried
to make him squirm! Her fingers closed brutally upon the Sèvres
handle of her fruit-knife. Was her power over the stronger sex on the
wane? That would be agreeable! In that case she might as well go and
bury herself in the snows of Tverna, as Basil had hinted that very
morning it might be wise for them to do. He had patiently explained
that the peasantry on this particular estate was being rendered
restless by agitators and _kabàk_ orators. Her exasperating
reflections were, however, cut short by the signal from Lady Seton,
which brought everybody to their feet. Bowing for once to Continental
etiquette, she had picked up both men and women with her eyes, and
therefore all assembled together in the adjoining salon, where
coffee, liqueurs, and cigarettes awaited them before a brilliant
fire.
Strangely enough, it was Basil who appeared at home beneath Sir
Robert and Lady Seton’s temporary roof-tree, not Laurence; for,
disinteresting herself utterly from her relatives and their guests,
she withdrew to a side-table and began to turn over the periodicals
and papers with which it was littered; her air and expression one of
mournful detachment, as if she had long since discovered that the
gilding of a cake may, after all, mark but indigestible dough, and
was trying to resign herself to this unwholesome diet with angelic
patience.
Greatly intrigued by this strange attitude, “Antinoüs” approached
her.
“You seem tired, _chère madame_. Will it weary you further if I take
a seat here and converse with you?” He was speaking with well-feigned
sympathy.
“Not in the least, Monsieur de Plenhöel,” she answered, drawing her
skirts aside to make room for him on the foot of the lounge to which
she had retreated. She did not see that he was considering her out of
the corner of an extraordinarily mocking eye.
“What I admire,” he was thinking, “are the transports of joy with
which she hails the reappearance of her uncle and aunt upon the
tapis.” But aloud he said, gently, “You remind me of one of our
Brittany wild roses to-night, madame.”
“Why wild?” she questioned, her eyes softening at the broad hint of
compliment. “I am very tame, I assure you.”
“Really!” he smiled. “One would scarcely connect you with tameness.
You are a pronounced personality, and such rarely submit to dulling
influences.”
She raised her pliant figure from the cushions among which she had
been nestling. “You think that?” she murmured, well pleased. “I was
afraid I was beginning to drift with the tide.”
“A tide of well-deserved success!” he asserted, his blue glances
flooding her with admiration. “You are a happy woman, madame, for at
the touch of your wand a kingdom has been flung at your little feet.”
“A kingdom!” she scoffed, looking at him between her lashes.
“Scarcely that!”
“A kingdom of infinite love and tenderness!” Régis de Plenhöel
explained in a suddenly altered tone.
“Oh!” she exclaimed. “Is that what you mean?”
“It is--or rather, it was a minute ago; for now I perceive that our
modern Titania is not satisfied with such a realm alone. Fortunately,
however, yours is not comprised within the mere compass of a human
heart--golden though it be--and I feel sure that you will wield your
scepter in right royal fashion.”
“You like hyperbole?” she retorted, with some pique. “Or has your
kinsman commissioned you to plead a cause already won?”
“I am a free-lance, madame, in the Field of the Cloth of Gold, or in
that of Clémence Isaure, at your service or your choice. But, seeing
you lost in dreams, I ventured to come and offer my belated
congratulations, since the other night you were so surrounded that I
did not get a chance to speak to you.”
“I accept them all the more gratefully, as it was in your house that
my good luck came to me, Monsieur le Marquis!”
“Don’t mention it!” retorted Régis, dropping all poetry of tone as
if he had suddenly been stung by a bee. “Besides, if you have any
one to thank, address yourself to the ‘Gamin,’ your eternal and
loyal champion.”
“I was not aware that I needed one!” was the spirited answer; and
Laurence let her swiftly hardening eye travel to the piano, at which
Marguerite had just seated herself. Neville and Preston Wynne stood
on either side of her, imploring her to sing, and she was smiling up
at them.
“Don’t let yourself be implored!” her father called across to her.
“You are not yet grown up enough for that. Let us have _‘Pauvre
P’tit Gas!’ mon ‘Gamin’_!”
Obediently Marguerite pulled off her long white gloves and began to
play a prelude in minor that seemed a lost echo of stormy seas,
filled now with the voices of great waves against a rock-bound coast,
and again with the sweep of the wind in the rigging of a doomed ship.
Complete and absolute silence fell upon the room at the first notes
of her surprisingly deep contralto:
“Nul ne connût jamais son âge!
Son nom? Ma foi, pas davantage!
Sa famille? Il n’en avait pas!
On l’avait trouvé sur la plage...
Pauvre P’tit Gas!”
Her extraordinary voice gave a strange pathos to the simple little
song, and sent a shiver between Basil’s shoulders. Preston and
Neville had fallen back and stood motionless, shoulder to shoulder,
listening intently to verse after verse of the quaint _complainte_:
“Lorsque la mer était mauvaise
Il chantait, le cour plus à l’aise,
Gité, malgré vents et frimas,
Dans un abri de la falaise...
Pauvre P’tit Gas!”
Down went the accompaniment a full octave; distant bells seemed to
mingle with the score. One could discern the sobbing at the sea now,
the pulsing of the tide, rising, rising, till with a swelling rush it
submerged the reefs.
“Or un soir la vague en furie....”
Marguerite had long since forgotten where she was. She was singing as
she had so often done on the cliffs of Plenhöel, and her _Pauvre
P’tit Gas_ was as real to her as he had seemed then:
“Malgré les brisants et l’orage
Il attint la côte à la nage
Puis il mourut ... tant était las!...
Pauvre P’tit Gas!”
Slower and slower came the words:
“Il fut pleuré dans les ténèbres....
Pauvre P’tit Gas!
Pauvre P’tit Gas!”
At the last wailing chords she seemed to awaken, rose, and faced
swiftly round, in evident surprise to see them all there, but utterly
unconscious of the prodigious effect created. A little smile played
hide-and-seek beneath “Antinoüs’s” mustache; _he_ had heard her
sing that before; but the rest had not, and the spell seemed unbroken
for a full minute before the applause began. The girl, startled and
embarrassed, looked around in a long glance of astonishment, and met
Basil’s eyes fixed upon hers in a manner she had never seen before;
but when the others surrounded her with enthusiastic expressions of
delight he remained where he had stood during her singing, and did
not speak.