Punctually at the appointed hour the young music-master arrived in Standon Square. It was for the last time, as Judith had said. Miss Crawford looked older, and Miss Crawford's cap looked newer, than either had ever done before. She put her weak little hand into Bertie's, and said some prim, kindly words about the satisfaction his lessons had given, the progress his pupils had made and the confidence she felt in his sister and himself. As she spoke she was sure he was gratified, for the color mounted to his face. Suddenly she stopped in the midst of her neatly-worded sentences. "You are like your mother, Mr. Lisle," she said: "I never saw it so much before." And she murmured something, half to herself, about her first pupil, the dearest of them all. Bertie, for once in his life, was silent and bashful.
The old lady rang the bell, and requested that Miss Macdonald might be told that it was time for her lesson and that Mr. Lisle had arrived. During the brief interval that ensued the music-master looked furtively round the room, as if he had never seen it before. It seemed to him almost as if he looked at it with different eyes, and read Miss Crawford's life in it. It was a prim, light-colored drawing-room, adorned with many trifles which were interesting as indications of patience and curious in point of taste. There was a great deal of worsted work, and still more of crochet. Everything that could possibly stand on a mat stood on a mat, and other mats lay disconsolately about, waiting as cabmen wait for a fare. Every piece of furniture was carefully arranged with a view to supporting the greatest possible number of anti-macassars. There were water-color paintings on the walls, and bouquets of wax flowers bloomed gayly under glass shades on every table. There were screens, cushions, pen-wipers. Bertie calculated that Miss Crawford's drawing-room might yield several quarts of beads. He had seen all these things many times, but they had acquired a new meaning and interest that day.
Miss Macdonald appeared, and Miss Crawford seated herself on a pink rose, about the size of a Jersey cabbage, with two colossal buds, and rested her tired back against a similar group. At the first notes of the piano her watchful and smiling face relaxed and she nodded wearily in the background. It did not matter much. The young master was grave, silent, patient, conscientious. In fact, it did not matter at all. Having slept through the earlier lessons, the schoolmistress might well sleep through this. It was rather a pity that, instead of taking a placid and unbroken rest on the sofa, she sat stiffly on a worked chair and started into uneasy wakefulness between the lessons, dismissing one girl and sending for the next with infinite politeness and propriety. At last she said, "And will you have the kindness to tell Miss Nash?"
Bertie sat turning over a piece of music till the sound of the opening door told him that his pupil had arrived. Then he rose and looked in her direction, but avoided her eyes.
There was no school-girl slovenliness about Emmeline Nash. Her gray dress was fresh and neat, a tiny bunch of spring flowers was fastened in it, a ribbon of delicate blue was round her neck. As she came forward with a slight flush on her cheek, her head carried defiantly and the sunlight shining on her pale hair, Miss Crawford said to herself that really she was a stylish girl, ladylike and pretty. Her schoolfellows declared that Emmeline always went about with her mouth hanging open. But that day the parted lips had an innocent expression of wonder and expectation.
The lesson was begun in as business-like a fashion as the others. Perhaps Emmeline regaled the young master with a few more false notes than usual, but she was curiously intent on the page before her. Presently she stole a glance over her shoulder at Miss Crawford. She was asleep. Emmeline played a few bars mechanically, and then she turned to Bertie.
The eyes which met her own had an anxious, tender, almost reverential, expression. This slim fair girl had suddenly become a very wonderful being to Lisle, and he touched her hand with delicate respect and looked strangely at her pretty vacant face.
Had there been the usual laughter lurking in his glance, Emmeline would have giggled. Her nerves were tensely strung, and giggling was her sole expression for a wide range of emotion. But his gravity astonished her so much that she looked at the page before her again, and went on playing with her mouth open.
Toward the close of the lesson master and pupil exchanged a few whispered words. "You may rely on me," said Bertie finally: "what did I promise this morning?" He spoke cautiously, watching Miss Crawford. She moved in her light slumber and uttered an inarticulate sound. The young people started asunder and blushed a guilty red. Emmeline, with an unfounded assumption of presence of mind, began to play a variation containing such loud and agitated discords that further slumber must have been miraculous. But Lisle interposed. "Gently," he said. "Let me show you how that should be played." And he lulled the sleeper with the tenderest harmony.
In due time the lesson came to an end. Miss Crawford presided over the farewell, and regretted that it was really Miss Nash's last lesson, as (though Mr. Lisle perhaps was not aware of it) she was not coming back to Standon Square. Mr. Lisle in his turn expressed much regret, and said that he should miss his pupil. "You must on no account forget to practise every day," said the old lady, turning to Emmeline.—"Must she, Mr. Lisle?"