"In that case, my dear lady, I leave most explicit orders that you neither sing a little nor play a little to Mr. Dalmain. We, who have our sight, can just endure while people who 'play a little' show us how little they can play; because we are able to look round about us and think of other things. But to a blind man, with an artist's sensitive soul, the experience might culminate in madness. We must not risk it. I regret to appear uncomplimentary, but a patient's welfare must take precedence of all other considerations."
Jane smiled. She was beginning to like Dr. Rob.
"I will be most careful," she said, "neither to play nor to sing to Mr. Dalmain."
"Good," said Dr. Mackenzie. "But now let me tell you what you most certainly may do, by-and-by. Lead him to the piano. Place him there upon a seat where he will feel secure; none of your twirly, rickety stools. Make a little notch on the key-board by which he can easily find middle C. Then let him relieve his pent-up soul by the painting of sound-pictures. You will find this will soon keep him happy for hours. And, if he is already something of a musician,—as that huge grand piano, with no knick-knacks on it indicates,—he may begin that sort of thing at once, before he is ready to be worried with the Braille system, or any other method of instructing the blind. But contrive an easy way—a little notch in the wood-work below the note—by means of which, without hesitation or irritation, he can locate himself instantly at middle C. Never mind the other notes. It is all the SEEING he will require when once he is at the piano. Ha, ha! Not bad for a Scotchman, eh, Nurse Gray?"
But Jane could not laugh; though somewhere in her mental background she seemed to hear laughter and applause from the duchess. This was no comedy to Jane,—her blind Garth at the piano, his dear beautiful head bent over the keys, his fingers feeling for that pathetic little notch, to be made by herself, below middle C. She loathed this individual who could make a pun on the subject of Garth's blindness, and, in the back of her mind, Tommy seemed to join the duchess, flapping up and down on his perch and shrieking: "Kick him out! Stop his jaw!"
"And now," said Dr. Mackenzie unexpectedly, "the next thing to be done, Nurse Gray, is to introduce you to the patient."
Jane felt the blood slowly leave her face and concentrate in a terrible pounding at her heart. But she stood her ground, and waited silently.
Dr. Mackenzie rang the bell. Simpson appeared.
"A decanter of sherry, a wine-glass, and a couple of biscuits," said Dr. Rob.
Simpson vanished.