There were several other people in the compartment,--a shy shop-girl and her middle-aged lover, evidently employés of the same establishment, and an artisan with his wife and a young child. Richard observed them intently, and found a curious, new pleasure in all their unstudied gestures and in everything they said. But chiefly he kept a watch on the shop-girl's lover, who made it no secret that he was dwelling in the seventh heaven. Richard sympathised with that man. His glance fell on him softly, benignantly. As the train passed station after station, he wondered what Adeline was doing, now, and now, and now. * * * * * On the following Saturday he took tea with Adeline at her lodgings. The train had been late, and by the time they were ready for the evening walk without which no visitor to the seaside calls the day complete, it was close upon nine o'clock. The beach was like a fair or a north-country wake. Conjurers, fire-eaters, and minstrels each drew an audience; but the principal attraction was a man and woman who wore masks and were commonly supposed to be distinguished persons to whom fate had been unkind. They had a piano in a donkey-cart, and the woman sang to the man's accompaniment. Just as Richard and Adeline came up, "The River of Years" was announced for performance. "Let us listen to this," said Adeline. They stood at the rim of the crowd. The woman had a rich contralto voice and sang with feeling, and her listeners were generous of both applause and coppers. "I wonder who she is," Adeline murmured, with a touch of melancholy,--"I wonder who she is. I love that song." "Oh, probably some broken-down concert-singer," Richard said curtly, "with a drunken husband." "But she sang beautifully. She made me feel--you know--funny.... A lovely feeling, isn't it?" She looked up at him. "Yes," he said, smiling at her. "You're laughing." "Indeed I'm not. I know what you mean perfectly well. Perhaps I had it just then, too--- a little. But the song is a bit cheap." "_I_ could listen to it every day, and never get tired of listening. Don't you think that if a song gives _anyone_ that--feeling, there must be some good in it?" "Of course it's far better than most; but--" "But not equal to those classical songs you told me about--the first time I saw you, wasn't it? Yes, Schubert: was that the name? I mean to get those, and you must show me the best ones, and play the accompaniments, and then I shall judge for myself." "I shall make an awful mess of the accompaniments; they're not precisely easy, you know." "Full of accidentals, are they? I sha'n't like them, then. I never do like that sort of song." "But you will; you must." "Must I?" she almost whispered, in tones of gentle, feminine surrender. And after a second or two: "Then I'll try, if it will keep you in a good temper."