“I hope that will not be needed,” he said, bowing (thinking with a pang, “They all know her better than I do").  “I am sure she will do equally well if we all beg the favor of her.”

“She has promised me to sing,” said Dr. B——­, “my pretty Languedoc air, which she has—­”

“Now that’s enough, you foolish old doctor!” and she went to the piano.  “Foolish old doctor!” He was the great gun of the scientific world:  the people about looked aghast at such impertinence, but the “great gun” only laughed and said, “I am mute if you command.”

How her hands trembled as she began!  This was her last and greatest card:  by it she had always felt she must hold him to her for ever, or lose her husband’s love in time.  She had never touched the piano before him or sung a note, but much of her leisure since their return to New York had been taken up, when he was out, in keeping herself in practice against the time when she should have a chance to play for him and sing to him.  She played the sweet air, with its Mozart-like, mournful cadences, entirely through ere she felt nerved enough to begin.  Then she sang in such a voice as made the most indifferent pause—­a voice that was like purple velvet for richness, as sweet as the breath of an heliotrope to which the sun had just said adieu, as clear as the notes of an English skylark—­this little song: 

  “See, love! the rosy radiance gleams
  Athwart the sunset sky: 
  List, love! and hear the bird’s sweet notes
  In lingering cadence die. 
  Clasp, love, thy clinging hands in mine,
  And, holding fast by me,
  Trust, love!  I will be true, my dove,
  Be ever true to thee—­
  So true, sweetheart, I’ll be,
  Sweetheart, to thee!

  “Come, love!  I waiting pine so long,
  And weary watch for thee: 
  Dear love! amidst my darkest night
  Thy star-like face I see. 
  Heart’s love! ah, come thou close to me: 
  I’ll shelter thee from harms,
  From every foe or secret woe,
  Close clasped within my arms: 
  Lie safe from all alarms,
  Sweetheart, with me.”

While they listened to her, those careless men and women, they thought they began to understand why this little, plain girl had won Ross Norval.  While everybody praised her, he stood utterly silent, too moved for words she saw, and refusing to sing again, she went up to him as the band began to play.  “My waltz, Ross,” she said.  He put his arm around her with a loving gesture that made those about them smile, and whirled her off.

“He’s the hardest hit man I’ve seen for years,” said one.

“And that such a thing should come to pass, as Ross Norval in love with his own wife, is beyond belief—­after making love to everybody else’s!”

“That’s it!  He was always the darling of fortune:  the choicest fruit always dropped his side the wall.”

But Ross, as he held her in that “tight hold” which was so much admired by his partners, said only, “Percy!  Percy!  I do not know you at all.  How cruel you are to me!  Everybody knows you and your gifts but me.”