As he neared the house, he heard Marie singing. There was a wild, pleading pathos in her voice, and a passionate earnestness, often sinking into a dreamy melody, so low and plaintive that Hugh almost held his breath for fear he might lose a single syllable of her words. She was singing a love song, with music even sweeter than the sentiment:
“By waters deep, in my lonely dreaming,
Come visions fair of a fancied seeming,
While other nights are wafted back to me;
Nights so fleeting, when our hearts were beating
With tender love and sweetest rhapsody.
On ebbing waters of languid river,
Where the moonbeams play and lances quiver,
Reflecting stars, from bending arch of blue,
I watch them glisten, and wait and listen