Appleton was pleased to see the girl again because he had always liked her face, and he was delighted to find that her voice not only harmonized with it, but increased its charm a hundredfold. Miss Tommy had several rather uncommon qualities in her equipment. One was that when she sang a high note she did it without exposing any of the avenues which led to her singing apparatus. She achieved her effects without pain to herself or to the observer, just flinging them off as gayly and irresponsibly as a bird on a bough, without showing any _modus operandi_. She had tenderness also, and fire, and a sense of humor which, while she never essayed a "comic" song, served her in good stead in certain old ballads with an irresistibly quaint twist in them. She made it perfectly clear that she was sorry for the poor lady who was running around the meadow preparing her flowery bier, but the conviction crept over you that she was secretly amused at the same time. Appleton heard the smile in her voice before he pulled aside the curtain and saw its counterpart on her face; heard and responded, for when Tommy tossed a smile at you, you caught it gratefully and tossed it back in the hope of getting a second and a third. Another arrow in Tommy's modest quiver was the establishment of an instantaneous intimacy between herself and her audience. The singing of her songs was precisely like the narration of so many stories, told so simply and directly that the most hardened critic would have his sting removed without being aware of it. He would know that Tommy hadn't a remarkable voice, but he would forget to mention it because space was limited. Sometimes he would say that she was an interpreter rather than a singer, and Tommy, for her part, was glad to be called anything, and grateful when she wasn't brutally arraigned for the microscopic size of her talent. It was Tommy's captivating friendliness and the quality of her smile that "did" for the shyest and stiffest of men, for by the time she had finished her programme the thunderbolt, the classic, the eternal thunderbolt, had fallen, and Fergus Appleton was in love. Tommy began her unconscious depredations with "Near Woodstock Town" and "Phillida Flouts Me," added fuel to the flames with "My Heart's in the Highlands" and "Charlie Is My Darling," and reduced his heart to ashes with "Allan Water" and "Has Sorrow Thy Young Days Shaded?" The smile began it, but it was tears that worked the final miracle, though moisture very rarely has this effect on fires of any sort.