sitor gave her an excuse for desertion. Of course a member of the
household was better than either; so she abdicated without misgiving
when--as she put it--she heard her young ladyship a-coming.

Her young ladyship was audible outside long enough for Mrs. Bailey to
abdicate before she entered the room. They met on the stairs and spoke.
Was that Mr. Torrens at the piano?--asked Gwen. Because if it was she
mustn't stop him. She would cry off and try her song another time.

But Mrs. Bailey reassured her, saying:--"He won't go on long, my lady.
You'll get your turn in five minutes," in an undertone. She added:--"He
won't see your music-paper. Trust him for that." These words must have
had a new hope in them for the young lady, for she said quickly: "You
think he _does_ see _something_, then?" The answer was ambiguous.
"Nothing to go by." Gwen had to be content with it.

* * * * *

Is there any strain of music known to man more harrowingly pathetic than
the one popularly known as _Erin go bragh_? Does it not make hearers
without a drop of Erse blood in their veins thrill and glow with a
patriotism that complete ignorance of the history of Ireland never
interferes with in the least? Do not their hearts pant for the blood of
the Saxon on the spot, even though their father's name be Baker and
their mother's Smith? Ours does.

Adrian Torrens, though his finger-tips felt strange on the keys in the
dark, and his hands were weak beyond his own suspicion of their
weakness, could still play the Polka for Mrs. Bailey. When his audience
no longer claimed repetition of that exciting air, he struck a chord or
two of some Beethoven, but shook his head with a sigh and gave it up.
However, less ambitious attempts were open to him, and he had happened
on Irish minstrelsy; so, left to himself, he sang _Savourneen Dheelish_
through.

Gwen, entering unheard, was glad she could dry her eyes undetected by
those sightless ones that she knew showed nothing to the singer--nothing
but a black void. The pathos of the air backed by the pathos of a voice
that went straight to her heart, made of it a lament over the blackness
of this void--over the glorious bygone sunlight, never a ray of it to be
shed again for him! There was no one in the room, and it was a relief to
her to have this right to unseen tears.

The feverish excitement of her sleepless night had subsided, but the
memory of a strange resolve clung to her