And mirthfully arching her mouth, she passed the gloves into my hand. A strong repugnance to touch them made me immediately drop them on a side table. Rachel’s originality carried her into strange humours. I was not sorry when the lamps were brought. They were of curious Venetian make, with round shades of silver lattice work filled in with cubes of gold-coloured glass. Their soft and pleasant light enhanced Rachel’s personal charm. She went to the piano soon, and calling me to her side, began to play. Never had I heard such wild and fantastical music as the first three melodies. They were Russian; savage, rough airs, which fretted me to unhealthy excess of inquietude. After the third, by which the soul is wrought to such a pitch that it is hard to refrain from shrieking, she began a plaintive air with a grotesque rhythm. ‘This is the tune the gnomes dance to on the hillside’, she said. ‘Here they emphasise the step; now they float round and round in rings; now the king is performing alone and they are all watching. My favourite is that one with the white slashed doublet and crooked face, with a moustache so long that it pricks the others. Ah, well! (with hands brought down clashingly) they must all creep through the bronze door. _So!_’ Then, playing another unfamiliar melody, she began to sing Shelley’s ‘Love’s Philosophy.’ I scarcely dare attempt to describe her voice. Poets have dreamed of its likes (heard them I may swear never); it was almost unearthly in its pathos, and tears were streaming from my eyes ere the first verse was ended. How she could sing so purely I cannot tell, but it seemed as if to the accompaniment of music all the dross were purged from her spiritual nature, and an innocence left, unsullied as that of our first mother ere she sinned. As the song went on a fuller harmony sustained her, and looking around, I saw that Mary’s hands swept delicately over the strings of a harp that stood in shadow. I leaned back, delivered to perfect delight, but just as my head pressed the cushion a sob came from Rachel’s lips, and rising hastily, she pressed her hands over her face and hurried from the room. Mary followed her, but returned almost immediately. ‘Cousin Rafe,’ she said nervously, ‘forget that Rachel has broken down--her singing often overpowers her--she feels everything too acutely. She begs you to pardon her absence for the rest of the evening. Recent events--my aunt’s illness and sudden death amongst them--have unnerved her; you must remember what great store they set on each other.’ The revulsion was very distressing. I had begun to regard Rachel as a woman of iron will, endowed with an intellect nothing could quail. This sign of weakness, coming so unexpectedly, surprised and pained me. Had I been more closely connected with her, I would have sought her chamber and drawn her head to my breast.