Many of those present appeared to enjoy this song.  Even Marcella Eubanks seemed for once to have soared above mere principle into the unmoral realm of “Art for Art’s sake.”  But it falls to be said, and I say it with a pride which I think should not excite cavil, that Miss Caroline frowned splendidly from the first moment that the song’s true character was revealed.  She superbly evinced uneasiness, moreover, when the thing was done, as if to say, “One can’t tell what may occur in a place where that is permitted!” And her performance was not observed by myself alone.  Marcella saw it and sped to her brother, who, after listening to hurried words from her, dashed into “The Lost Chord” with a swift and desperate fervor, as if to allay all alarm in the mind of this sensitive guest.  Eustace was at heart as earnestly well meaning as any Eubanks that ever lived, and his vagaries in song were attributable solely to a trusting nature capriciously endowed with a dash of the artistic temperament.  It was only a dash, however.  Beyond doubt, had his family but known, he could have sung the “Bedouin Love Song,” and been none the worse for it.

If Miss Caroline’s eloquent pantomime at this time aroused a suspicion that she had been maligned, as to her habits of drink, her behavior on a subsequent evening, when Mrs. Judge Robinson entertained, left no one to doubt it.  There was music, too, on this occasion—­described elsewhere as “a gala occasion”—­after Eustace had concluded his part of the entertainment and gotten his lantern out of the way,—­music by a quartet consisting of Messrs. Fancett and Eubanks, first and second bass, and Messrs. Updyke and G. Brown, first and second tenor.  In excellent accord these tenors and basses, so blameless in their living, lifted up their voices and sang they “would that the wavelets of ocean were wavelets of sparkling champagne!” It was a blithe and rippling morceau if one could forget the well-nigh cosmic depravity of it; but Miss Caroline, it appeared, was not able to forget.  She confided as much to Marcella Eubanks and Aunt Delia McCormick, intimating that while she was doubly desirous to be pleased because of her position as an outsider, she was, nevertheless, a silly old woman, encrusted with prejudice, and she could not deny that she found this song suggestive.  Her eyes glistened when she said it, and Marcella felt like pinning a white ribbon to her then and there.

Escorting Miss Caroline to her home that night, I listened to her account of this colloquy and found myself wishing that matters had been different.  It seemed to me that I must ultimately become the victim of a romantic passion for her, and I told her as much when we parted.

Gossip, the yellow-tongued dragon, had been tracked to its lair and done to death, or at least that one of its heads had been smitten off which babbled slander of Miss Caroline.

Thenceforth she and I were free to think upon other matters.  And there were these other matters in both our lives.