Page:Harris Dickson--Old Reliable in Africa.djvu/33

 rested against her shoulder and she caressed it with her chin; two slender fingers danced along its unawakened strings. Presently she picked up the bow and with a movement indescribably graceful stroked the chords so gently that they only purred.

"Ain't you gwine to play none, Missy?" Zack's inquiry was a prayer, yet Miss Stanton shook her head and glanced around at the shaded lights, through the crimson-and-gold silence of that deserted room. Outside the fog gathered like twilight; when twilight had settled in the valleys at home she always played her violin.

Unconsciously she lifted the bow and roused one long low note, as the sigh of a sleeper who begins to stir. Zack caught his breath, then begged, "Missy, play 'Ole Black Jo'; jes, a teeny bit."

Without dissent or volition the violin responded, inaudibly but distinctly, when Zack bent closer. He could almost hear the murmured words, "I'm comin'—I'm comin'." When it was quite done he whispered again, "Now, Missy, play 'Swanee Ribber.

Miss Stanton forgot, forgot the ship, and forgot these stranger-people, forgot the dismal evening, the raucous fog-horns, forgot everything. Out from her soul, and the soul of her violin that tender melody ebbed and flowed, lapping