"You!" answered Levillier.
And then each knew that the other was in some nervous crisis that rendered action almost an impossibility. And while they thus hesitated there came a loud, repeated, and unsteady knock at the door. Julian opened it. Valentine's man was standing outside, pale and anxious.
"Good God, sir," he ejaculated. "What is it? What on earth is the matter?"
The man's exclamation broke through Julian's frost of inaction. He whispered to Wade:
"It's all right," pushed him out and shut the door. Then he went straight up to the piano, seized Valentine's hands and dragged them from the keyboard.
The silence was like a sweet blow.
"I said my voice was out of order," Valentine said, simply and with a smile.
"You did not say you had another voice, the voice of—of a devil," Julian said, almost falteringly, for he was still shaken by his distress of the senses, into a mental condition that was almost anger.
Dr. Levillier said nothing. More sensitive to musical sounds than Julian, he dared not speak, lest he should say something that might stand like a fixed gulf to eternally separate him from Valentine. He knew the future that stretches out like a spear beyond one word. So he sat quietly with his eyes on the ground. His lips were set firmly together. Valentine turned to observe him.
"Doctor, you're not angry?" he asked.