“I wish I had a voice like yours, Miss Cameron.”

“I daresay you have a better of your own,” said Euphra, falsely.

Lady Emily laughed.

“It is the poorest little voice you ever heard; yet I confess I am glad, for my own sake, that I have even that.  What should I do if I never heard Handel!”

Every simple mind has a little well of beauty somewhere in its precincts, which flows and warbles, even when the owner is unheedful.  The religion of Lady Emily had led her into a region far beyond the reach of her intellect, in which there sprang a constant fountain of sacred song.  To it she owed her highest moods.

“Then Handel is your musician?” said Euphra.  “You should not have put me to such a test.  It was very unfair of you, Lady Emily.”

Lady Emily laughed, as if quite amused at the idea of having done Euphra any wrong.  Euphra added: 

“You must sing now, Lady Emily.  You cannot refuse, after the admission you have just made.”

“I confess it is only fair; but I warn you to expect nothing.”

She took her place at the piano, and sang —­ He shall feed his flock.  Her health had improved so much during her sojourn at Arnstead, that, when she began to sing, the quantity of her voice surprised herself; but after all, it was a poor voice; and the execution, if clear of any great faults, made no other pretence to merit.  Yet she effected the end of the music, the very result which every musician would most desire, wherein Euphra had failed utterly.  This was worthy of note, and Hugh was not even yet too blind to perceive it.  Lady Emily, with very ordinary intellect, and paltry religious opinions, yet because she was good herself, and religious —­ could, in the reproduction of the highest kind of music, greatly surpass the spirited, intellectual musician, whose voice was as superior to hers as a nightingale’s to a sparrow’s, and whose knowledge of music and musical power generally, surpassed hers beyond all comparison.

It must be allowed for Euphra, that she seemed to have gained some perception of the fact.  Perhaps she had seen signs of emotion in Hugh’s face, which he had shaded with his hand as Lady Emily sang; or perhaps the singing produced in her a feeling which she had not had when singing herself.  All I know is, that the same night —­ while Hugh was walking up and down his room, meditating on this defect of Euphra’s, and yet feeling that if she could sing only devil’s music, he must love her —­ a tap came to the door which made him start with the suggestion of the former mysterious noises of a similar kind; that he sprang to the door; and that, instead of looking out on a vacant corridor, as he all but anticipated, he saw Euphra standing there in the dark —­ who said in a whisper: 

“Ah! you do not love me any longer, because Lady Emily can sing psalms better than I can!”

There was both pathos and spite in the speech.