Hugh smiled. He couldn't imagine his sprightly sister in the story book rôle of uncomplaining heroine, and he wouldn't wish to have her so, not for the world. Ivy was Ivy with all her faults; he wouldn't wish to have her otherwise except a happier Ivy, with the blessing of health and strength, flitting gaily through life, having part in the work and the play of the world.
CHAPTER VI
A SCORNFUL BEAUTY
Ivy could not have complained of Alene's want of animation had she followed her home after rehearsal one afternoon a few days later.
She entered the library, threw her hat on a chair and herself upon a snug little sofa that stood invitingly in the embrasure of a window, which, by drawing the crimson curtains, could be shut off from the rest of the room, leaving a cosy den—her favorite place for dreaming and reading, where her eyes, straying from her book, rested on an ever-varying picture of sky and river, which the window framed.
To-day, not waiting to shut herself away, and paying no attention to the smiling landscape, she opened a sheet of foolscap paper that she had held clasped tightly in her hand, and gravely perused the lines of Ivy's angular writing which covered it. A similar sheet had been given to the other actors in the dialogue so that each might learn his part at leisure.
"'I ask for beauty—' yes, you little numskull, ask for it,—that's all people think you're good for! Laura, of course, never thought of it that way but others will! And I don't wish for it, I'd rather be a poet any day!
'I ask the poet's gift, the lyre,
With skillful hand to sweep each wire,
I'd pour my burning thoughts in song,
In lays deep, passionate and strong,
Till heart should thrill at every word
As mind is thrilled at song of bird!
Oh, I would die and leave some trace
That earth had been my dwelling place,
Would live in hearts forevermore
When this frail, fitful life is o'er!
Oh, for the gifted poet's power—
This is my wish, be this my dower!"
Alene jumped to her feet, and standing in the window facing the room, recited the words with a dash and a fire that brought forth a "Bravo!" from Uncle Fred, who on his way through the hall had heard her voice and, stopping softly at the door, witnessed her performance.