She kissed the girl, saying:
“Yes, you can always earn money by your singing; but you can always achieve much more by it: there is no one alive who could remain unmoved when you sing.”
“I will sing to you every night,” cried Clare. “You will tell me when I fail to do what I set out in the hope of doing in any of my songs. That, the maestro says, is the sure test of singing; if you make yourself intelligible you can sing, if you are unintelligible you are wrong. No composer who is truly great will write merely for the sake of showing what difficulties a vocalist can overcome by teaching and practice; he will not be intricate, only when he cannot express himself with simplicity. I think music is the most glorious of all the arts.”
She quoted from her master as they went upstairs to their bedrooms and then kissed and parted. But though Clare was asleep within a few minutes of lying down, Agnes was not so fortunate. She lay awake for an hour thinking her thoughts, and then she rose, and wrapping a fur-lined cloak about her, sat down in a chair in front of the fire, looking into its depths.
“I cannot send her away again,” she said. “I cannot send her out into the world. God has given me her life, and I have accepted the trust. I cannot send her away. He need never learn the truth, the terrible truth. Oh, if he had but some pity! If she could but impart some pity to him!”
Another hour had passed before she rose, saying once more, in a tone of decision:
“Yes, she shall stay. Whether it be for good or evil she shall stay. If I cannot win him back I shall still have her.”
Somehow, Agnes did not now feel so strongly as she had done a few days before that it was laid on her to win back Claude. The fact was that, after her last conversation with Sir Percival, she had been led to consider by what means she should endeavor to win him back to her. What were the arts which she should practise to compass this end? She had often read of the successful attempts made by young women to regain the affections of the men who had been cruel enough—in some cases wise enough—to forsake them. She could not, however, remember exactly what means they had adopted to effect their purpose. She had an idea that most of the men had been brought by force of circumstances to perceive how false-hearted the other girl was; she had a distinct recollection that the other girl played a very important part in the return of the lover to his first and only true love.
After giving some consideration to the matter she came to the conclusion that she, too, could only trust to time to lead Claude back to her. She thought of the lines:
“Having waited all my life, I can well wait