“To be sure,—I ought to have guessed it; and sings too, I'll be bound?”
“Like Grisi, sir,” responded the waiter, enthusiastically; for the Tirlemont, being frequented by the artistic class, had given him great opportunity for forming his taste.
Just at this moment a rich, full voice swelled forth in one of the popular airs of Verdi, but with a degree of ease and freedom that showed the singer soared very far indeed above the pretensions of mere amateurship.
“Wasn't I right, sir?” asked the waiter, triumphantly. “You'll not hear anything better at the Grand Opera.”
“Send me up some hot water, and open that portmanteau,” said Beecher, while he walked on towards the door of the salon. He hesitated for a second or two about then presenting himself; but as he thought of Grog Davis, and what Grog Davis's daughter must be like, he turned the handle and entered.
A lady rose from the piano as the door opened, and even in the half-darkened room Beecher could perceive that she was graceful, and with an elegance in her gesture for which he was in no wise prepared.
“Have I the honor to address Miss Davis?”
“You are Mr. Annesley Beecher, the gentleman my papa has been expecting,” said she, with an easy smile. “He has just gone off to meet you.”
Nothing could be more commonplace than these words, but they were uttered in a way that at once declared the breeding of the speaker. She spoke to a friend of her father, and there was a tone of one who felt that even in a first meeting a certain amount of intimacy might subsist between them.
“It's very strange,” said Beecher, “but your father and I have been friends this many a year—close friends too—and I never as much as suspected he had a daughter. What a shame of him not to have given me the pleasure of knowing you before!”