Page:Our Little Girl (1923).pdf/87

 back of the house, ready to laugh at the poor old man. A funny weak Troubadour, they said. But my Paul was an artist. When he sang that aria every word was so clear that the last student in the gallery could hear it. They listened when he sang it. He sang with more than a voice. He sang with his soul. He could not sing a big high C—no—but he could sing with his heart. He moved them, my child! He moved them! And when he finished, the applause—oh, you never heard anything like it!

“And why? Because his beautiful diction was so fine. Because they knew that my poor Paul was singing. . . . Now let us try it again.”

Under the maternal methods of Mme. Graaberg, Dorothy could feel herself developing. Her first appearance at one of the Friday afternoon students’ recitals was no ordeal, for all of the stories that she had heard of girls collapsing from nervousness on these occasions. In the back row of the little auditorium she could see Mme. Graaberg smiling at her. She sang for Mme. Graaberg. And the shaking of pedagogic heads in the vicinity of her preceptress told her that she had made an impression.

“They liked you, my child!” cried Mme. Graaberg after the recital.

“Did they say much?” inquired Dorothy.

“They were much pleased with your intelligence, your poise and your diction,” said Mme. Graaberg. “They liked your interpretation. We have not worked together for nothing, eh?”

She squeezed Dorothy’s hand affectionately.

“And how calm you were! If you are always so at ease, it will be wonderful. My poor Paul was always so nervous. Even near the end, when he had been singing twenty years, he was so frightened. I would have to sit with him in his dressing-room and hold his hand for