But no one came. Lynn had taken the Cremona from its case with something very like a smile upon his face. The brown breasts had the colour of old wine, and the shell was thin to the point of fragility.
He had feared to touch it, but the Master had only laughed at him. “What!” he had said, “shall I not sometimes lend mine Cremona to mine son, who like mineself is one great artist? Of a surety!”
Lynn placed the instrument in position, and dreamily, began to play. His mother was out, and he played as he could not if he had not thought himself alone. All his heartbreak, all his pain, the white nights and the dark days went into the adagio, the one thing suited to his mood.
At the first notes, Iris drew a quick, gasping breath. Surely it was not Lynn! Yet who else should be in his room, playing as no one played but the great?
Primeval forces held her in their grasp, and all at once her shallowness fell away from her, leaving her free. The blood surged into her heart with shame—she had wronged Lynn. She had been so blind, so painfully sure of herself, so pitifully important in her self-esteem!
The music went on without hindrance or pause. Deep chords and piercing flights of melody alternated through the theme, yet there was the undertone of love and night and death. Iris clenched her hands until the nails cut into her palms. All her life, she seemed to have been playing with tinsel; now, when it was out of her reach, she had discovered the gold.
Why should it seem so strange for Lynn to play like this? Had he not written the letters? Had he not offered her his whole heart—the gift she had so insultingly thrown aside? Iris knelt beside the chest, in bitter humiliation.
One thing was certain—she must go away, and quickly. She could not wait there, trembling and afraid, until someone found her; she must get away, but how? She was sorely shaken, both in body and soul.
She could not go away, and yet she must. She would go to the station, and, from there, write to Mrs. Irving and to Lynn. The least she could do was to ask him to forgive her. Having done that, she would go back to the city, change her address, and be lost to them forever.
Low, quivering tones came from the Cremona, like the sobs of a woman whose heart was broken. Suddenly, Iris knew that she belonged to Lynn—that through love or hate she was bound to him forever. Then, in a blinding flood came the tears.