“Will you sing the ‘Eva’ music at the concert?”
“I?”
He bowed silently, and still kept his eyes fixed upon my face, as if to say, “Refuse if you dare.”
“I—I’m afraid I should make such a mess of it,” I murmured at last.
“Why any more than to-day?”
“Oh! but all the people!” said I, expostulating; “it is so different.”
He gave a little laugh of some amusement.
“How odd! and yet how like you!” said he. “Do you suppose that the people who will be at the concert will be half as much alive to your defects as I am? If you can sing before me, surely you can sing before so many rows of—”
“Cabbages? I wish I could think they were.”