Page:Georges Eekhoud - Escal Vigor, a novel.djvu/63

Rh of the music, and he performed on the spot a very slow dance, comparable to the trembling of aspens on those summer nights, when the breeze is reduced to a gentle zephyr that only plants may breathe. The sculptural contour of this young rustic, who united the muscular relief of his compeers to a certain correctness of outline, recalled exactly to Kehlmark the Pipe player of Frans Hals. This youth seemed to him a wonderful living picture of the canvas in the Upperzyde museum. His heart tightened; he held his breath, a prey to overpowering emotion.

Michel Govaertz, having noticed the attention which the Dykgrave bestowed on the young soloist, seized the opportunity of the pause which followed, to accost the latter and led him by the ear, so roughly as to risk bruising it, towards Kehlmark.

Nothing could justly render the expression, at once piteous, scared, and rapt, of the young bugle-player, when thus suddenly confronted with the Dykgrave. It seemed as though in his eyes and on his lips was concentrated all the sublime distress of a martyr.

"Count," exclaimed the coarse-grained