"But before you go, girls," said Miss Pinsett, laying a fragile, white slender hand on each, "you must sing for me some of the songs you used to sing—you know some very pretty duets."
Mary Leonard and Lucy Eastman paused, amazed, and looked into each other's faces in dismay. Sing?—had they ever sung duets? They had not sung a note for years, except in church.
"But I don't know any songs, Miss Pinsett," stammered Mary Leonard.
"I have forgotten all I ever knew," echoed Lucy Eastman.
"No excuses, now—no excuses! You were always great for excuses, but you would always sing for me. I want 'County Guy,' to begin with."
By a common impulse the visitors moved slowly towards the piano; they would try, at least, since Miss Pinsett wanted them to. Lucy seated herself and struck a few uncertain chords. Possibly the once familiar room, Mary Leonard at her side, Miss Pinsett listening in her own high-backed chair, the scent of the mignonette in the blue bowl—possibly one or all of these things brought back the old tune.
"Ah, County Guy,
The hour is nigh,
The sun has left the lea."
The sweet, slender voice floated through the room, and Mary Leonard's deeper contralto joined and strengthened it.
"Now, I will have 'Flow Gently, Sweet Afton,'" said Miss Pinsett, quite as if it were a matter of course. And they sang "Flow Gently, Sweet Afton." It was during the last verse that the parlor door opened softly, and a tall, fine-looking man, erect, with beautiful silver curling hair, and firm lines about the handsome, clean-shaven mouth, appeared on the threshold and stood waiting. As the singing finished, Miss Pinsett shook her head at him.
"You were always coming in and breaking up the singing, Tom Endover," she said.