“I wonder,” he said, assuming a meditative air, “what will become of you?  Eventually, I mean.”

“What do you think?” Her eagerness told him that he had struck the right note.

“You have grown up in an atmosphere of great music, far removed from the tendencies of our day.  You have received from your father an extraordinary musical education.  He has prepared you on all points but one for your career, he has not developed your voice; his ambition intervened—­”

“You must not say that.  Father does not allow his ambition to interfere with his duties regarding me.  You only think that because you do not know him; you don’t know all the difficulties he has to contend with.”

Owen smiled inwardly, pleased at the perception he had shown in divining her feelings, and he congratulated himself on having sown some slight seed of discontent; and then, as if he were withdrawing, or at least attenuating, the suggestion he had thrown out, he said—­

“Anyone can see that you and your father are very attached to each other.”

“Can they?”

“You always like to be near him, and your favourite attitude is with your hand on his shoulder.”

“So many people have noticed that.  Yes, I am very fond of father.  We were always very fond of each other, but now we are more like pals than father and daughter.”

He encouraged her to talk of herself, to tell him the story of her childhood, and how she and her father formed this great friendship.  Evelyn’s story of her mother’s death would have interested him if he had been able to bestow sufficient attention upon it, but the intricacy of the intrigue he was entering upon engrossed his thoughts.  There were her love of her father, her duty towards him, and her piety to be overcome.  Against these three considerable influences there were her personal ambition and her love of him.  A very evenly matched game, he thought, and for nothing in the world would he have missed this love adventure.

At that moment the words, “A few days later she died,” caught on his ear.  So he called all the sorrow and reverence he could into his eyes, sighed, and raised his eyebrows expressing such philosophic resignation in our mortal lot as might suffice to excuse a change in the conversation.

“That is the picture gallery,” Evelyn said, pointing to a low brick building, almost hidden at the back of a well-kept garden.  The unobtrusive doorway was covered with a massive creeper, just beginning to emerge from it’s winter’s rust.  “Do you care to go in?” she said negligently.

“You know the pictures so well, I am afraid they will bore you.”

“No, I should like to see them with you.”

He could see that her aesthetic taste had been absorbed by music, and that pictures meant nothing to her, but they meant a great deal to him, and, unable to resist the temptation, he said—­“Let us go in for a little while, though it does seem a pity to waste this beautiful Spring day.”