"May I sing you one of my own songs?" Humphrey asked her, paying no attention to the rest.
He sat down and struck a note and began a song. It had no melody; it was without a beginning and without an end; the words told nothing, neither a story nor a sentiment; like the music to which they were set, they began in the middle of a sentence and ended with a semicolon. His voice was good enough, but uncultivated. When he finished, he closed the piano, as if there was to be no more music after him.
"It is music," he said coldly, "of the advanced school. I am proud to belong to the music of the future—the true expression of Art in song."
"I will show you"—Richard opened the piano and took his place—"I will show you something of the music of the present."
With vigorous and practised fingers he ran up and down the notes; then he struck into an air—light, easy, catching, and began to sing the "Song of the Tramp"—one of his vagabond songs.
Mrs. Haveril sat watching the two young men. When Dick began, the other one turned away sullenly, and began to look into a portfolio of etchings, with the air of one who will not listen.
"Doctor," she whispered, "that young man sings and plays exactly like my husband. It might be the same. He would sit down and sing just that same way, as if nothing ever happened and nothing mattered. I wonder how men can go on like that, with age and sickness and the end before them. Women never can. Oh, how like my husband he is! The other is not like him in manner; not a bit; yet in face—oh, in face—and voice—and eyes—and hair! It is wonderful!"
"One can hardly expect the son of Sir Humphrey Woodroffe to be altogether like a comedian."
"Yet," she repeated, "so like him in face and everything; I cannot get over it."