“’T was just like him. He’s so good, so generous! He gives me the rent of this house with the pretty garden attached. You can see it from the window. Look at the grapes. He reserves for himself this room, which I daily dust and keep in order. Poor man! ’T was here he passed the few months of his marriage, years ago. His wife died, and he bought the house, and has kept it in repair ever since. This used to be their sleeping-room. ’T was also their parlor, for they were poor. There’s their little case of books. Here’s the piano on which they used to play duets. ’T was a hired piano, and was returned to the owner; but Mr. Vance found it in an old warehouse, not long ago, had it put in order, and brought here. ’T is one of Chickering’s best; a superb instrument. You should hear Mr. Vance play on it.” “Does he play well?” asked Clara, who had almost forgotten her own troubles in listening to the little woman’s gossip. “Ah! you never heard such playing! I know something of music. My family is musical. I flatter myself I’m a judge. I’ve heard Thalberg, Vieuxtemps, Jael, Gottschalk; and Mr. Vance plays better than any of them.” “Is he a professor?” “No, merely an amateur. But he puts a soul into the notes. Do you play at all, my dear?” “Yes, I began to learn so early that I cannot recollect the time when.” “I thought you must be musical. Just try this instrument, my dear, that is, if you ’re not too tired.” “Certainly, if ’t will oblige you.” Seating herself at the piano, Clara played, from Donizetti’s _Lucia_, Edgardo’s melodious wail of abandonment and despair, “_L’ universo intero e un deserto per me sensa Lucia_.” Mrs. Bernard had opened the door that Vance might hear. At the conclusion he knocked and entered. “Is this the way you rest yourself, young pilgrim?” he asked. “You’re a proficient, I see. You’ve been made to practise four hours a day.” “Yes, ever since I can remember.” “So I should think. Now let me hear something in a different vein.” Clara, while the blood mounted to her forehead, and her whole frame dilated, struck into the “Star-spangled Banner,” playing it with her whole soul, and at the close singing the refrain, “And the Star-spangled Banner in triumph shall wave O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave.” “But that’s treason!” cried Mrs. Bernard. “Yes, Mrs. Bernard,” said Vance, “run at once to the police-station. Tell them to send a file of soldiers. We must have her arrested.” “O no, no!” exclaimed Clara, deceived by Vance’s grave acting. Then, seeing her mistake, she laughed, and said: “That’s too bad. I thought for a moment you were in earnest.” “We will spare you this time,” said Vance, with a smile that made his whole face luminous; “but should outsiders in the street hear you, they may not be so forbearing. They will tear our little house down if you’re not careful.”