"I do."

The reluctance seemed to fade out of him.

"The fact is I'm torn between the desire to hear my things and a mighty
distaste for publicity."

He sprang up.

"If you'll allow me I'll just give you an idea of my Te Deum. And then
I'll have done."

He went once more to the piano.

When he was sitting beside her again Mrs. Mansfield felt shy of him.
After a moment she said:

"You are sincere in your music?"

"Yes."

He did not seem specially anxious to get at her exact opinion of his
work, and this fact, she scarcely knew why, pleased Mrs. Mansfield.

"I had two or three things done at the College concerts," Heath
continued. "I don't think they were much liked. They were considered
very clever technically. But what's that? Of course, one must conquer
one's means or one can't express oneself at all."

"And now you work quite alone?"

"Yes. I've got just a thousand a year of my own," he said abruptly.

"You are independent, then."

"Yes. It isn't a great deal. Of course, I quite realize that the sort of
thing I do could never bring in a penny of money. So I've no money
temptation to resist in keeping quiet. There isn't a penny in my
compositions. I know that."

Mrs. Mansfield thought, "If he were to get a mystical libretto and write
an opera!" But she did not say it. She felt that she would not care to
suggest anything to Heath which might indicate a desire on her part to
see him "a success." In her ears were perpetually sounding the words,
"and the water thereof was dried up, that the way of the Kings of the
East might be prepared." They took her away from London. They set her in
the midst of a great strangeness. They even awoke in her an almost
riotous feeling of desire. What she desired she could not have said
exactly. Some form of happiness, that was all she knew. But how the
thought of happiness stung her soul at that moment! She looked at Heath
and said:

"I quite understand about Mrs. Shiffney now."

"Yes?"

"You have the dangerous gift of a very peculiar and very powerful
imagination. I think your music might make you enemies."

Heath looked pleased.

"I'm glad you think that. I know exactly what you mean."

They sat together on the settle and talked for more than an hour. Mrs.
Mansfield's feeling of shyness speedily vanished, was replaced by
something maternal with which she was much more at ease.

Mrs. Searle let her out. She had said good-bye to Heath in the studio
and asked h