Page:Henry B. Fuller - Bertram Cope's Year, 1919.djvu/221

 voice which she had heard through the soaring, insinuating tones of the other. Foster, sitting beside her, suddenly raised his shade and peered out ques-tioningly, both at the singers and at his sister-in-law. He seemed surprised—and more.

Pearson was surprised too, but kept his applause within limits. However, he praised Lemoyne for his accompaniment. Then he begged Amy for an air on the violin; and while they were determining who should play her accompaniment, the wind raged more wildly round the gables and the thickening snow drove with a fiercer impetus against the windows.

Lemoyne (who was a perfectly good sight-reader) begged that he might not be condemned to spoil another's performance. This was the result of an understanding between Cope and himself that neither was to contribute further. Presently a simple piece was selected through which the unskilled Carolyn might be trusted to pick her way. Cope listened with a decorous attention which was designed to indicate the highest degree of sympathetic interest; but his attitude, so finely composed within, yet so ineffectively displayed without, was as nothing to the loud promptness of Pearson's praise. Amy glanced at Cope with questioning surprise; but she met Pearson's excesses of commendation with a gratified smile.

Shortly before ten o'clock there was a stir at the front door. Mrs. Phillips rose hastily. "It is M. Pelouse; let me go down and get him."

Yes, it was M. Pelouse. "Oh, Madame!" he said, as before, but with an expressiveness doubly charged,