Inez interrupted one of these communions, when Helen supposed herself alone with Debussy. Lately she had found herself turning to the charm and mystery of his atmosphere, the strangeness of his idiom, the vagueness of his rhythms, and the fugitive grace and fancy of his harmonic expression with an understanding and a surrender which she had never before felt. The music reflected upon her its delicate perception of nature in all its moods—the splash of the waves upon the shore, the roaring of the surf, the gloom of the forests relieved by the moonlight on the trees.
“Don’t, Helen—I beg of you!” Inez exclaimed, suddenly. “Say it to me, but don’t torture me with those weird reproaches. Every note almost drives me wild!”
“Why, Inez, dear!” cried Helen, startled by the girl’s words no less than by the suddenness of the interruption. “What in the world do you mean? You should have told me before if my playing affected you so.”
“I love it, Helen,” she replied; “but lately it has hurt me through and through. I can hear your voice echoing in every note you strike, and I feel its bitter reproach.”
Helen tried to draw Inez beside her, but the girl sank upon the floor, resting her elbows on Helen’s knees and looking up into her face with tense earnestness.
“You have been terribly unstrung these days, dear,” Helen replied, “and you are unstrung now or you would not discover what does not exist. It is your instinctive sympathy for poor Mélisande that makes you feel so—you see her, as I do, floating resistlessly over the terraces and fountains, the plaything of Fate, a phantom of love and longing and uncertainty. That is what you feel, dear.”
Helen took Inez’ face between her hands and looked into her eyes for a moment. “People call it mystical and unreal,” she continued, “but I believe that some of us have it in our own lives, don’t you?”
Inez did not reply directly, and struggled to escape the searching gaze.
“Helen,” she said, abruptly, “I simply cannot stay on here; I shall go mad if I do. Each time I suggest going you say that you need me, and it seems ungrateful, after all you have done for me, to speak as I do. But you cannot understand. I am not myself, and I am getting into a condition which will make me a burden to you instead of a help.”
“I do need you, dear,” Helen replied, quietly, “but certainly not at the expense either of your health or your happiness. The effects of the accident have lasted much longer than I thought they would. I wanted you to be quite recovered before you left us.”