‘Oh!  I’m not Patience,’ Milly objected stiffly; she was only Ella.  ‘Besides, I mayn’t, may I, mamma?’

‘Your father might not like it,’ said Leonora.

‘The dad has taken Bran out for a walk, so it won’t trouble him,’ Ethel interjected sleepily under her breath.

‘Well, but look here, Mrs. Stanway,’ said Harry conclusively, ’the organist at the Wesleyan chapel actually plays the sextet from Patience for a voluntary.  What about that?  If there’s no harm in that——­’ Leonora surrendered.  ‘Come on, Mill,’ he commanded.  ’I shall have to return to my muttons directly,’ and he opened the piano.

‘But I tell you I’m not Patience.’

’Come on!  You know the music all right.  Then we’ll try Ella’s bit in the first act.  I’ll play.’

Millicent arose, shook her hair, and walked to the piano with the mien of a prima donna who has the capitals of Europe at her feet, exultant in her youth, her charm, her voice, revelling unconsciously in the vivacity of her blood, and consciously in her power over Harry, which Harry strove in vain to conceal under an assumed equanimity.

And as Millicent sang the ballad Leonora was beguiled, by her singing, into a mood of vague but overpowering melancholy.  It seemed tragic that that fresh and pure voice, that innocent vanity, and that untested self-confidence should change and fade as maturity succeeded adolescence and decay succeeded maturity; it seemed intolerable that the ineffable charm of the girl’s youth must be slowly filched away by the thefts of time.  ‘I was like that once!  And Jack too!’ she thought, as she gazed absently at the pair in front of the piano.  And it appeared incredible to her that she was the mother of that tall womanly creature, that the little morsel of a child which she had borne one night had become a daughter of Eve, with a magic to mesmerise errant glances and desires.  She had a glimpse of the significance of Nature’s eternal iterance.  Then her mood developed a bitterness against Millicent.  She thought cruelly that Millicent’s magic was no part of the girl’s soul, no talent acquired by loving exertion, but something extrinsic, unavoidable, and unmeritorious.  Why was it so?  Why should fate treat Milly like a godchild?  Why should she have prettiness, and adorableness, and the lyric gift, and such abounding confident youth?  Why should circumstances fall out so that she could meet her unacknowledged lover openly at all seasons?  Leonora’s eyes wandered to the figure of Ethel reclining with shut eyes in the arm-chair.  Ethel in her graver and more diffident beauty had already begun to taste the sadness of the world.  Ethel might not stand victoriously by her lover in the midst of the drawing-room, nor joyously flip his ear when he struck a wrong note on the piano.  Ethel, far more passionate than the active Milly, could only dream of her lover, and see him by stealth.  Leonora grieved for Ethel, and envied her too, for her dreams,