“O, I’ve not been idle. Such choice books as you have here! And then what a variety of music!” “Have you studied any of the pieces?” “Not many. That from Schubert.” “Please play it for me.” Tacitly accepting him as her teacher, she played it without embarrassment. Vance checked her here and there, and suggested a change. He uttered no other word of praise than to say: “If you’ll practise six years longer four hours a day, you’ll be a player.” “I shall do it!” said Clara. “Have you heard that famous Hallelujah Chorus, which the Northern soldiers sing?” “No, Mr. Vance.” “No? Why, ’tis in honor of John Brown (any relation of Perdita?) You shall hear it.” And he played the well-known air, now appropriated by the hand-organs. Clara asked for a repetition, that she might remember it. “Sing me something,” he said. Clara placed on the reading-frame the song of “Pestal.” “Not that, Perdita! What possessed you to study that?” “It suited my mood. Will you not hear it?” “No!... Yes, Perdita. Pardon my abruptness. But that song was the first I ever heard from lips, O so fair and dear to me!” Clara put aside the music, and walked away toward the window. Vance went up to her. He could see that she was with difficulty curbing her tears. O, if this man whose very presence inspired such confidence and hope,—if it was sweeter to him to _remember_ another than to _listen_ to _her_,—where in the wide world should she find, in her desperate strait, a friend? There was that in her attitude which reminded Vance of Estelle. Some lemon-blossoms in her hair intensified the association by their odors. For a moment it was as if he had thrown off the burden of twenty years, and was living over, in Clara’s presence, that ambrosial hour of first love on the very spot of its birth. “For O, she stood beside him like his youth,—transformed for him the real to a dream, clothing the palpable and the familiar with golden exhalations of the dawn!” Be wary, Vance! One look, one tone amiss, and there’ll be danger! “Let us talk over your affairs,” he said. “To-morrow I must leave for Natchez. Will you remain here till I come back?” Clara leaned out of the window a moment, as if to enjoy the balmy evening, and then, calmly taking a seat, replied: “I think ’t will be best for me to lay my case before Miss Tremaine. True, we parted in a pet, but she may not be implacable. Yes, I will call on her. To you, a stranger, what return for your kindness can I make?” “This return, Perdita: let me be your friend. As soon as ’t is discovered you’ve no money, your position may become a painful one. Let me supply you with funds. I’m rich; and my only heir is my country.” “No, Mr. Vance! I’ve no claim upon you,—none whatever. What I want for the moment is a shelter; and Laura will give me that, I’m confident.”