Page:Elizabeth Jordan--Tales of the cloister.djvu/112

. A smile enlarged Ernestine's round face, but she said nothing. She was a child of intelligence and sturdy German reserve.

Two months later "the Sister Cecilia" sat in her private music-room, putting on paper the notes of a melody that had rung in her ears for days. It was Saturday afternoon, and that wing of the great building was deserted. A February storm of sleet and snow beat upon the windows, but the nun heard nothing of it. Beside her a grand piano stood open, and she vibrated between the instrument and her writing-table, playing a few bars of her music, then writing rapidly with her near-sighted eyes close to the paper. It was not singular that she failed to hear the soft beat of a little hand on the outside of the heavy door—a child's tentative rap. It was repeated, and followed by three distinct strokes from knuckles of a very different kind. Then the door opened, and Ernestine flew into the room, impetuously pulling with her a tall, blond woman, wrapped in heavy furs. The child was radiant. Every dimple was on exhibition, and her eyes danced as she whirled her companion towards the table from which the nun had hastily risen. It did not need the resemblance between the two to tell Sister Cecilia who her distinguished visitor was,