The music was
about to begin. Indeed, it could be heard already in the distance, and
drew the girl irresistibly. For the first time that day she made a move,
and the others followed, half wearied of their dissipations, and not
knowing exactly what to do next.
They stood the first half of the concert very well, but at the
intermission they wandered out to view the electric fountain with its
many-colored fluctuations, and to take a row on the tiny sheet of water.
Elizabeth remained sitting where she was, and watched the fountain. Even
her grandmother and aunt grew restless, and wanted to walk again. They
said they had had enough music, and did not want to hear any more. They
could hear it well enough, anyway, from further off. They believed they
would have some ice-cream. Didn't Elizabeth want some?
She smiled sweetly. Would grandmother mind if she sat right there and
heard the second part of the concert? She loved music, and this was fine.
She didn't feel like eating another thing to-night. So the two ladies,
thinking the girl queer that she didn't want ice-cream, went off to enjoy
theirs with a clear conscience; and Elizabeth drew a long breath, and sat
back with her eyes closed, to test and breathe in the sweet sounds that
were beginning to float out delicately as if to feel whether the
atmosphere were right for what was to come after.
It was just at the close of this wonderful music, which the programme said
was Mendelssohn's "Spring Song," when Elizabeth looked up to meet the eyes
of some one who stood near in the aisle watching her, and there beside her
stood the man of the wilderness!
He was looking at her face, drinking in the beauty of the profile and
wondering whether he were right.
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