Annie looked up with irrepressible surprise that he should recognize it. She was so used to an audience who considered all music above the level of Offenbach as a not unpleasant noise that her face beamed with pleasure at his very simple remark.
“I will play you another—my favorite,” said she.
And, in her delight at being with an appreciative listener, she played better than usual, and at the end looked up naively for his approval. He gave it without stint; and she went on from these to other favorite pieces, which she knew well enough to be able to talk at the same time.
“You must lead an isolated life here, I should think, with no one to talk to?”
“So I don’t talk,” said she, smiling; “I run wild in the fields with William.”
“Do you like the life?”
“Yes and—no. I like it when I don’t think. I like walking so far and running so fast and jumping over so many ditches that I am too tired at night to do anything but long for bed-time.”
“But you can’t pass all your life like that.”
“That is the worst of it. I hate the thought of coming back to semi-civilization when I am too old for my savage pastimes.”
“You used to write a little, I think you told me. Have you given it up!”