e dilemma.

What is it that now and again makes a woman in a single moment take
such a powerful grip of a man's fancy that he can never shake
himself free again, and never wants to?

Tunes can be like that, sometimes. Not the pretty little tinkling
tunes that please everybody at once; the pleasure of them can fade
in a year, a month--even a week, a day! But those from a great mint,
and whose charm will last a man his lifetime!

Many years ago a great pianist, to amuse some friends (of whom I was
one), played a series of waltzes by Schubert which I had never heard
before--the "Soirees de Vienne," I think they were called. They were
lovely from beginning to end; but one short measure in particular
was full of such extraordinary enchantment for me that it has really
haunted me through life. It is as if it were made on purpose for me
alone, a little intimate aside a mon intention--the gainliest,
happiest thought I had ever heard expressed in music. For nobody
else seemed to think those particular bars were more beautiful than
all the rest; but, oh! the difference to me!

And said I to myself: "That's Leah; and all the rest is some
heavenly garden of roses she's walking in!"

Tempo di valsa:

_Rum_--tiddle-iddle _um_ tum tum,
_Tid_dle-tiddle-iddle-iddle _um_ tum, tum
_Tum_ tiddle iddle-iddle _um_ tum, tum
_Tid_dle-iddle, iddle-_hay!_ ... etc., etc.

That's how the little measure begins, and it goes on just for a
couple of pages. I can't write music, unfortunately, and I've nobody
by me at just this moment who can; but if the reader is musical and
knows the "Soirees de Vienne," he will guess the particular waltz I
mean.

Well, the Duesseldorf railway station is not a garden of roses; but
when Leah stepped out of that second-class carriage and looked
straight at Barty, _dans le blanc des yeux_, he fitted her to the
tune _he_ loved best just then (not knowing the "Soirees de
Vienne"), and it's one of the tunes that last forever:

"Du bist die Ruh', der Friede mild!"

Barty's senses were not as other men's senses. With his one eye he
saw much that most of _us_ can't see with two; I feel sure of this.
And he suddenly saw in Leah's face, now she was quite grown up, that
which bound him to her for life--some veiled promise, I suppose; we
can't explain these things.

* * * * *

Barty escorted the Gibson party to Riffrath, and put down Mrs.
Bletchley's name for