"I can't bear it."
She did not know what she meant she could not bear.
He made a strange answer. He said:
"If you will go into the house, open the windows and sing to me--the last
song I heard you sing--I'll go. But to-morrow I'll come and touch my
helping hand, and after to-morrow, and every day."
"Sing--?" she said vacantly. "To-night!"
"Go into the house. Open the window. I shall hear you."
He spoke almost sternly.
She crossed the piazza slowly. A candle was burning in the hall. She took
it up and went into the drawing-room, which was in black darkness. There
was a piano in it, close to a tall window which looked on to the lake.
She set the candle down on the piano, went to the window, unbarred the
shutters and threw the window open. Instantly she heard the sound of oars
as Carey sent his boat towards the water beneath the window. She drew
back, went again to the piano, sat down, opened it, put her hands on the
keys. How could she sing? But she must make him go away. While he was
there she could not think, could not grip herself, could not--She struck
a chord. The sound of music, the doing of a familiar action, had a
strange effect upon her. She felt as if she recovered clear consciousness
after an anaesthetic. She struck another chord. What did he want? The
concert--that song. Her fingers found the prelude, her lips the poetry,
her voice the music. And then suddenly her heart found the meaning, more
than the meaning, the eternal meanings of the things unutterable, the
things that lie beyond the world in the deep souls of the women who are
the saviours of men.
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