wife than
by outsiders!" but she bit her lips, and kept the gibe back. A rebuke of
this form and gravity was a novelty in their relations. The fear that it
had been merited troubled, even while it did not convince, her mind, and
the puzzled apprehension was to be read plainly enough on her face.

Theron, noting it, saw a good deal more behind. Really, it was amazing
how much wiser he had grown all at once. He had been married for years,
and it was only this morning that he suddenly discovered how a wife
ought to be handled. He continued to look sternly away into space for a
little. Then his brows relaxed slowly and under the visible influence of
melting considerations. He nodded his head, turned toward her abruptly,
and broke the silence with labored amiability.

"Come, come--the day began so pleasantly--it was so good to feel well
again--let us talk about the piano instead. That is," he added, with an
obvious overture to playfulness, "if the thought of having a piano is
not too distasteful to you."

Alice yielded almost effusively to his altered mood. They went together
into the sitting-room, to measure and decide between the two available
spaces which were at their disposal, and he insisted with resolute
magnanimity on her settling this question entirely by herself. When at
last he mentioned the fact that it was Friday, and he would look over
some sermon memoranda before he went out, Alice retired to the kitchen
in openly cheerful spirits.

Theron spread some old manuscript sermons before him on his desk,
and took down his scribbling-book as well. But there his application
flagged, and he surrendered himself instead, chin on hand, to staring
out at the rhododendron in the yard. He recalled how he had seen Soulsby
patiently studying this identical bush. The notion of Soulsby, not
knowing at all how to sing, yet diligently learning those sixths,
brought a smile to his mind; and then he seemed to hear Celia calling
out over her shoulder, "That's what Chopin does--he sings!" The spirit
of that wonderful music came back to him, enfolded him in its wings. It
seemed to raise itself up--a palpable barrier between him and all that
he had known and felt and done before. That was his new birth--that
marvellous night with the piano. The conceit pleased him--not the less
because there flashed along with it the thought that it was a poet that
had been born. Yes; the former country lout, the narrow zealot, the
untutored slave g