“I understand you, dear Hadria,” said Henriette, drawing her chair closer to the fire. “You know, Hubert can never keep anything of great importance from me.” She looked arch.
Hadria muttered something that might have discouraged a less persistent spirit, but Miss Temperley paid no attention.
“Poor Hubert! I have had to be a ministering angel to him during these last months.”
“Why do you open up this subject, Miss Temperley?”
“Henriette, if you please,” cried that young woman, with the air of a playful potentate who has requested a favoured courtier to drop the ceremonious “Your Majesty” in private conversation.
“It was I who made him accept Mrs. Gordon’s invitation. He very nearly refused it. He feared that it would be unpleasant for you. But I insisted on his coming. Why should he not? He would like so much to come here more often, but again he fears to displease you. He is not a Temperley for nothing. They are not of the race of fools who rush in where angels fear to tread.”
“Are they not?” asked Hadria absently.
“We both see your difficulty,” Miss Temperley went on. “Hubert would not so misunderstand you—the dear fellow is full of delicacy—and I should dearly love to hear him play to your accompaniment; he used to enjoy those practices so much. Would you think him intrusive if he brought his ’cello some afternoon?”
Hadria, not without an uneasy qualm, agreed to the suggestion, though by no means cordially.
Accordingly brother and sister arrived, one afternoon, for the practice. Henriette took the leadership, visibly employed tact and judgment, talked a great deal, and was surprisingly delicate, as beseemed a Temperley. Hadria found the occasion somewhat trying nevertheless, and Hubert stumbled, at first, in his playing. In a few minutes, however, both musicians became possessed by the music, and then all went well. Henriette sat in an easy chair and listened critically. Now and then she would call out “bravo,” or “admirable,” and when the performance was over, she was warm in her congratulations.