"You wish me to sing to you," she says, gently, yet so unsmilingly that the duchess wonders what has come to the child. "It will give me pleasure if I can give you pleasure, but my voice is not worth thinking about."
"Nevertheless, let me hear it," says the duchess. "I cannot forget that your face is musical."
Mona, sitting down to the piano, plays a few chords in a slow, plaintive fashion, and then begins. Paul Rodney has come to the doorway, and is standing there gazing at her, though she knows it not. The ballroom is far distant, so far that the sound of the band does not break upon the silence of the room in which they are assembled. A hush falls upon the listeners as Mona's fresh, pathetic, tender voice rises into the air.
It is an old song she chooses, and simple as old, and sweet as simple. I almost forget the words now, but I know it runs in this wise:
Oh, hame, hame—hame fain wad I be,
Hame, hame to my ain countrie,
and so on.
It touches the hearts of all who hear it as she sings it and brings tears to the eyes of the duchess. So used the little fragile daughter to sing who is now chanting in heaven!
There is no vehement applause as Mona takes her fingers from the keys, but every one says, "Thank you," in a low tone. Geoffrey, going up to her, leans over her chair and whispers, with some agitation,—
"You did not mean it, Mona, did you? You are content here with me?—you have no regret?"
At which Mona turns round to him a face very pale, but full of such love as should rejoice the heart of any man, and says, tremulously,—