wer,
supposed that she felt it an indignity to be asked to play in such
company.

Mrs. Thornburgh motioned to him to come and sit by Mrs. Leyburn, a
summons which he obeyed with the more alacrity, as it brought him once
more within reach of Mrs. Leyburn's eldest daughter.

'Are you fond of music, Mr. Elsmere?' asked Mrs. Leyburn in her little
mincing voice, making room for his chair beside them. 'If you are, I am
sure my youngest daughter's playing will please you.'

Catherine moved abruptly. Robert, while he made some pleasant answer,
divined that the reserved and stately daughter must be often troubled by
the mother's expansiveness.

Meanwhile the room was again settling itself to listen. Mrs. Seaton was
severely turning over a photograph book. In her opinion the violin was
an unbecoming instrument for young women. Miss Barks sat upright with
the studiously neutral expression which befits the artist asked to
listen to a rival. Mr. Thornburgh sat pensive, one foot drooped over the
other. He was very fond of the Leyburn girls, but music seemed to him,
good man, one of the least comprehensible of human pleasures. As for
Rose, she had at last arranged herself and her accompanist Agnes, after
routing out from her music a couple of _Fantasie-Stuecke_, which she had
wickedly chosen as presenting the most severely classical contrast to
the 'rubbish' played by the preceding performers. She stood with her
lithe figure in its old-fashioned dress thrown out against the black
coats of a group of gentlemen beyond, one slim arched foot advanced, the
ends of the blue sash dangling, the hand and arm, beautifully formed,
but still wanting the roundness of womanhood, raised high for action,
the lightly poised head thrown back with an air. Robert thought her a
bewitching, half-grown thing, overflowing with potentialities of future
brilliance and empire.

Her music astonished him. Where had a little provincial maiden learned
to play with this intelligence, this force, this delicate command of her
instrument? He was not a musician, and therefore could not gauge her
exactly, but he was more or less familiar with music and its standards,
as all people become nowadays who live in a highly cultivated society,
and he knew enough at any rate to see that what he was listening to was
remarkable, was out of the common range. Still more evident was this,
when from the humorous piece with which the sisters led off--a dance of
clowns, but clowns