ve never heard anything like that before. It says everything that
can't be said in words alone, doesn't it? It makes me think of
something--What is it?" He groped for a moment, then repeated:

"'A passionate ballad, gallant and gay, Singing afar in the springtime
of life, Singing of youth and of love And of honor that cannot die.'"

Io drew a deep, tremulous breath. "Yes; it's like that. What a voice!
And what an art to be buried out here! It's one of her own songs, I
think. Probably an unpublished one."

"Her own? Does she write music?"

"She is Royce Melvin, the composer. Does that mean anything to you?"

He shook his head.

"Some day it will. They say that he--every one thinks it's a he--will
take Massenet's place as a lyrical composer. I found her out by
accidentally coming on the manuscript of a Melvin song that I knew.
That's her secret that I spoke of. Do you mind my having told you?"

"Why, no. It'll never go any further. I wonder why she never told me.
And why she keeps so shut off from the world here."

"Ah; that's another secret, and one that I shan't tell you," returned Io
gravely. "There's the piano again."

A few indeterminate chords came to their ears. There followed a jangling
disharmony. They waited, but there was nothing more. They rode on.

At the lodge Banneker took the horses around while Io went in.
Immediately her voice, with a note of alarm in it, summoned him. He
found her bending over Miss Van Arsdale, who lay across the divan in the
living-room with eyes closed, breathing jerkily. Her lips were blue and
her hands looked shockingly lifeless.

"Carry her into her room," directed Io.

Banneker picked up the tall, strong-built form without effort and
deposited it on the bed in the inner room.

"Open all the windows," commanded the girl. "See if you can find me some
ammonia or camphor. Quick! She looks as if she were dying."

One after another Banneker tried the bottles on the dresser. "Here it
is. Ammonia," he said.

In his eagerness he knocked a silver-mounted photograph to the floor. He
thrust the drug into the girl's hand and watched her helplessly as she
worked over the limp figure on the bed. Mechanically he picked up the
fallen picture to replace it. There looked out at him the face of a man
of early middle age, a face of manifest intellectual power, high-boned,
long-lined, and of the austere, almost ascetic beauty which the
Florentine coins have preserved for us in clear fi