There is a tremendous charm in her singing: her style is so simple; her voice is so fresh; you can hear every word she says, and she always sings the right songs. How this sort of singing makes a man think! I can't describe the effect it had upon me. As Miss Virginia touched the tinny, stringy old notes and went from song to song,—now an Irish melody, now a nigger one, now an English ballad,—I forgot all about the day's worries; I forgot the motor and the cut tires and the bad weather and the beastly picnic—it was a kind of heaven. If I marry, it must be some one who can sing like this. I have been changing my preferences for blonde women lately. No doubt they look very nice when young, but they don't wear well, I feel sure, and get purple and chilblainy in cold weather. Of course the dark ones are apt to turn drab and mottled, but not when they have as much colour as Miss Virginia. All sorts of scraps of thoughts and ideas chased each other through my mind as she sang. She had got on to a thing she had sung in the hotel several times,—a plantation Christmas carol she called it, the sort of thing you cannot forget once you have heard it, either the words or the music.
'Oh, dat star's still shinin' dis Chrismus Day,
Rise, O sinner, and foller!
Wid an eye o' faith you c'n see its ray,
Rise, O sinner, and foller!
Leave yo' fader,
Leave yo' mudder,
Leave yo' sister,
Leave yo' brudder,
An' rise, O sinner, and foller!'