"The Musoline Overture," he answered. "You played it on the first
evening when I came to Ramelton. I remember so well how you played it
then. Play it again to-night. I want to compare."
"I have played it since."
"Never to me."
They were alone in the room; the windows stood open; it was a night of
moonlight. Ethne suddenly crossed to the lamp and put it out. She
resumed her seat, while Durrance remained in the shadow, leaning
forward, with his hands upon his knees, listening--but with an
intentness of which he had given no sign that evening. He was applying,
as he thought, a final test upon which his life and hers should be
decided. Ethne's violin would tell him assuredly whether he was right or
no. Would friendship speak from it or the something more than
friendship?
Ethne played the overture, and as she played she forgot that Durrance
was in the room behind her. In the garden the air was still and
summer-warm and fragrant; on the creek the moonlight lay like a solid
floor of silver; the trees stood dreaming to the stars; and as the music
floated loud out across the silent lawn, Ethne had a sudden fancy that
it might perhaps travel down the creek and over Salcombe Bar and across
the moonlit seas, and strike small yet wonderfully clear like fairy
music upon the ears of a man sleeping somewhere far away beneath the
brightness of the southern stars with the cool night wind of the desert
blowing upon his face.
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