Miss Ayr of Virginia, & other stories

by Julia Magruder

Her beauty was positively enthralling, but oh, her voice! At the thought of that, he turned cold with dread, and then hot with angry protest. What did Mensenn mean? How could he let her adorn her loveliness like this, to be led as a victim to the sacrifice? He knew the character of the audience assembled, and he knew that they were not people to be inveigled into the toleration of such a voice by mere beauty. The very fact that she had such a beautiful and correct method would make the thing all the more an insult to their intelligence. He was almost beside himself with anger and mortification. He longed passionately to rush upon the stage and drag her away, and to hide her beautiful, unconscious face against his heart, before she had come to feel the contempt and indignation which the audience, now spellbound by her beauty, would very soon have ready for her.

Across the wild confusion of these frantic, angry thoughts a sound fell, a sound so sweet, so powerful, so exquisite, that it was like the voice of peace, speaking with a strong, commanding influence to his soul. It was a voice that satisfied, for the first time in his life, the utmost ideal of Randall’s soul! Not only was it the perfect method that he knew, but the voice, itself, was so gloriously exquisite, so fine, so clear, so passionately sweet, that his soul was wrapt in ecstacy. It was almost too cruelly sweet. Randall shuddered, and, when the song ended, he dropped his face in his hands and gave a sort of sob.

Then there came from the audience an absolute storm of applause. So tempestuous and excited was it, that the girl was evidently divided between pleasure and fright, and when Mensenn came to her and led her from the stage, she was so visibly shaken that she could not, at once, respond to the encore. It seemed to Randall cruel—it made him madly indignant that they should make this demand upon her, and while the clapping and calling was at its height, he left his box, and made his way into the street.

For an hour or more he walked about trying to secure some degree of calmness, and to solve this inscrutable mystery. What was the secret of this miraculous change of voice? Had it all been a clever imitation of inferiority and discordant sound that she had practiced behind her mask? How could it be possible to so disguise the voice of a lark or of an angel such as this? And what could have been the object? Whatever it was, the creature who had long ago won his love, and who had now by the possession of this voice deepened that love to adoration, was the woman he must have for his wife, if work of man and prayers to heaven could accomplish it! The fact that she had been a masked street singer, the uncertain quantity of her relation toward the man who had played with her in that character,—all these things vanished, and Randall was possessed by the headlong wish, which dominated everything else, of getting access to her immediately, and begging her to become his wife.

He made his way back at last to the concert hall, and found the audience just dispersing. He had not wished to hear her sing again; he felt that it would be more than he could bear, but he had a definite purpose in view as he made his way to the rear of the stage. Here he met several men whom he knew, coming away.

“It’s no use, my boy!” said one of these. “Old Mensenn is immovable. He not only will not introduce us, but he refuses, for the present, to answer any questions. Perhaps he’s wise, for after such an ovation as this, if she showed up, she’d run the risk of being eaten alive. The women are as mad over her as the men.” Randall hurried on, however, and catching sight of the well-known face of old Mensenn, approached him with a certain confidence. The man had known him long, and, as Randall hoped, in a way that had made him trust him. Every effort which he made was perfectly useless, however. It was evident that no exception to his decision was to be made.

Randall was turning away half-resentfully when a man, small and unremarkable in appearance, came from a long, dark passage and, seeing him, stopped a second, and then, as if recognizing him, approached rapidly and said:

“You do not know me, but you rendered me and mine a service once, which I can never forget. You are the man who punished the brute who offered an insult to the being dearest to me in the world. I saw you from behind my mask, and have often wished that I could thank you properly for what you did. Will you call to see me to-morrow afternoon at four, and let me introduce you to my daughter that she may thank you, too?” And while Randall stood astonished and delighted, the man gave the address of the house opposite his own, and then walked away.

Randall, on his way home, felt, in spite of his joy at this stroke of fortune, as puzzled and confused in mind as ever. It was an untold relief to learn that the man with whom the woman he loved had sung in the public streets was her father, but oh, how could he have let her do it? What sort of a father could he be? And yet his somewhat pathetic face had beamed with tenderness during the few seconds in which he had spoken to him. Well, one great burden had been rolled away from his heart by the discovery of this relationship between the street singer and her companion; another had gone with the discovery that that awful sound of discord was not her natural voice; and the one that still remained, the fact that she had been a masked street singer, lay heavy on his heart still, but contrasted with the love he had for this woman, that burden he was more than ready to carry.

The next afternoon at precisely four, he rang at the door of the opposite house, and asked for Mr. May. The servant led him up several flights of stairs to the very top of the house, and then along a dark passage leading to the back building, and here she knocked at a door, and then turned and left him. A man’s voice called “Come in!” and Randall opened the door and saw his new acquaintance sitting at a table writing, and at his side his old acquaintance seated on a low chair engaged in stroking Tommy, who was greatly grown. He did not see the kitten at first, because of the fact that the young girl was dressed in deep, intense black, which swathed her to her throat and wrists. It made the brilliant loveliness of her face, however, all the more startling, as she rose to her feet, still holding Tommy, and recognized him with her usual tribute of a rosy blush. His appearance was evidently a surprise to her, though it soon became evident that her father had prepared her for the reception of a stranger, and had told her to what cause the visit was due.