t as a fleet coming out of
action, they are as twisted and garbled as a Chinese war telegram; it
is like an hospital for congenitally diseased compositions taking the
air. And they have to hobble along sharply too; there is a certain
cruel decision in the way the notes are struck, a Nurse Gillespie touch
about this Invisible Lady. Or it may be the callousness of old habit,
a certain sense of a duty overdone, a certain impatience at the long
delay. You will hear.

"Listen!--_Tum Tum Ti-ti-tum_--No!--_tum_. Slight pause. Tum _tum
twiddle_--vigorous crescendo--TUM. This is unusual! A stranger? A
new piece for La Belle Dame Sans Merci? Her wonted reckless dash
deserts her. She is, as it were, exploring a new region, and advances
with mischievous coyness, with an affectation of a faltering heart,
with hesitating steps. My imagination is stimulated by these dripping
notes. I see her, as it were, on an uneven pavement; here the flags
are set on end, there fungi have tilted them, a sharp turning of the
page may reveal heaven knows what horrors; presently comes a black gap
with a vault of dusty silence below. A pause, an incoherency, a
repetition! She has encountered some difficulty, some slumbering coil
of sharps and flats, and it raises its bristling front in her way....
She has fled back to the opening again. I begin to wonder what unhappy
musician lies hidden in this new ruin, behind the bars of this
melancholy confusion. There is something familiar but elusive, like a
face that one has known and loved and lost and met again after the
cruel changes of intervening years. It conjures up oddly enough a
vision of a long room in the twilight, and an acacia in silhouette
against the pale gold of the western sky. Ah! now I know!

"_That_ of all pieces!

"I must have my walk, George. I cannot bear to hear that old-familiar
music so evilly entreated. But, all the same, the memory it has
touched will vibrate and smart; to-day and to-morrow, and I know not
for how many days, it will re-echo in my brain. All the old cloudy
remorse that has subsided will be set astir again. I shall hear again
a light touch upon the keys, see again the shadowy face against the
sunset, try to recall the sound of a voice.... What evil spirit has
put this mockery into the head of La Belle Dame? Surely without
this----"

He made a dive at the folding doors and presently reappeared in his
coat. It was the only intimation I ever ha