"Well, that beats everything I've ever heard!" she murmured tremulously.

I could say nothing,--I was too occupied with my own thoughts. Something in the music had instilled itself into my blood, or so I fancied, and the clinging subtle sweetness of it, moved me to strange emotions that were neither wise, nor worthy of a man. I looked at Lady Sibyl; she was very pale,--her eyes were cast down and her hands were trembling. On a sudden impulse I rose and went to Rimanez where he still sat at the piano, his hands dumbly wandering over the keys.

"You are a great master"--I said--"A wonderful performer! But do you know what your music suggests?"

He met my fixed gaze, shrugged his shoulders, and shook his head.

"Crime!" I whispered--"You have roused in me evil thoughts of which I am ashamed. I did not think that was possible to so divine an Art."

He smiled, and his eyes glittered with the steely brightness of stars on a wintry night.

"Art takes its colours from the mind, my dear friend;"--he said--"If you discover evil suggestions in my music, the evil, I fear, must be in your own nature."

"Or in yours!" I said quickly.

"Or in mine;"--he agreed coldly--"I have often told you I am no saint."

I stood hesitatingly, looking at him. For one moment his great personal beauty appeared hateful to me, though I knew not why. Then the feeling of distrust and repulsion slowly pa.s.sed, leaving me humiliated and abashed.

"Pardon me, Lucio!" I murmured regretfully--"I spoke in haste; but truly your music almost put me in a state of frenzy,--I never heard anything in the least like it----"

"Nor I,"--said Lady Sibyl, who just then moved towards the piano--"It was marvellous! Do you know, it quite frightened me?"

"I am sorry!" he answered with a penitent air--"I know I am quite a failure as a pianist--I am not sufficiently 'restrained,' as the press men would say."

"A failure? Good G.o.d!" exclaimed Lord Elton at this juncture--"Why, if you played like that in public, you'd drive everyone frantic!"

"With alarm?" queried Lucio, laughing--"Or with disgust?"

"Nonsense! you know what I mean very well. I have always had a contempt for the piano as an instrument, but by Jove! I never heard such music as yours even in a full orchestra. It is extraordinary!--it is positively magnificent! Where in the world did you study?"

"In Nature's conservatoire;"--replied Rimanez lazily. "My first 'maestro' was an amiable nightingale. He, singing on a branch of fir when the moon was full, explained with liquid-noted patience, how to construct and produce a pure roulade, cadenza and trill,--and when I had learned thus far, he showed me all the most elaborate methods of applying rhythmic tune to the upward and downward rush of the wind, thus supplying me with perfect counterpoint. Chords I learned from old Neptune, who was good enough to toss a few of his largest billows to the sh.o.r.e for my special benefit. He nearly deafened me with his instructions, being somewhat excitable and loud-voiced,--but on finding me an apt pupil, he drew back his waves to himself with so much delicacy among the pebbles and sand, that at once I mastered the secret of playing _arpeggi_. Once too I had a finishing lesson from a Dream,--a mystic thing with wild hair and wings--it sang one word in my ears, and the word was unp.r.o.nounceable in mortal speech,--but after many efforts I discovered it lurking in the scale of sound. The best part of it all was, that my instructors asked no fees!"

"I think you are a poet as well as a musician,"--said Lady Sibyl.

"A poet! Spare me!--my dear young lady, why are you so cruel as to load me with so vile an imputation! Better be a murderer than a poet,--one is treated with much more respect and courteous consideration,--by the press at anyrate. The murderer's breakfast-menu will be given due place in many of the most estimable journals,--but the poet's lack of both breakfast and dinner will be deemed his fitting reward. Call me a live-stock producer, a horse-breeder, a timber-merchant,--anything but a poet! Why even Tennyson became an amateur milkman to somewhat conceal and excuse the shame and degradation of writing verse!"

We all laughed.

"Well, you must admit," said Lord Elton, "that we've had rather too much of poets lately. It's no wonder we're sick of them, and that poetry has fallen into disrepute. Poets are such a quarrelsome lot too--effeminate, puling, unmanly humbugs!"

"You are speaking of the newly 'discovered' ones of course," said Lucio--"Yes, they are a weedy collection. I have sometimes thought that out of pure philanthropy I would start a bon-bon manufactory, and employ them to write mottoes for the crackers. It would keep them out of mischief and provide them with a little pocket-money, for as matters stand they do not make a farthing by their books. But I do not call them 'poets' at all,--they are mere rhymers. One or two real poets do exist, but, like the prophets of Scripture, they are not 'in society,' nor can they get their logs rolled by any of their contemporaries. They are not favourites with any 'set'; that is why I am afraid my dear friend Tempest will never be accepted as the genius he is; society will be too fond of him to let him go down into dust and ashes to gather the laurel."

"It is not necessary to go down into dust and ashes for that," I said.

"I a.s.sure you it is!--" he answered gaily--"Positively imperative. The laurel flourishes best so,--it will not grow in a hot-house."

At that moment Diana Chesney approached.

"Lady Elton would like to hear you sing, prince--" she said--"Will you give us that pleasure? Do! Something quite simple, you know,--it will set our nerves straight after your terribly beautiful music! You'd hardly believe it perhaps,--but I really feel quite unstrung!"

He folded his hands with a droll air of penitence.

"Forgive me!" he said, "I'm always, as the church service says, doing those things I ought not to do."

Miss Chesney laughed, a trifle nervously.

"Oh, I forgive you!" she replied--"On condition that you sing."

"I obey!" and with that he turned again to the piano, and playing a strange wild minor accompaniment sang the following stanzas:

Sleep, my Beloved, sleep!

Be patient!--we shall keep Our secret closely hid Beneath the coffin-lid,-- There is no other place in earth or air For such a love as ours, or such despair!

And neither h.e.l.l nor heaven shall care to win Our loathed souls, rejoicing in their sin!

Sleep!--for my hand is sure,-- The cold steel bright and pure Strikes through thy heart and mine Shedding our blood like wine;-- Sin's sweetness is too sweet, and if the shame Of love must be our curse, we hurl the blame Back on the G.o.ds who gave us love with breath And tortured us from pa.s.sion into death!

This strange song, sung in the most glorious of baritones, full and rich, and vibrating with power and sweetness, had a visibly thrilling effect upon us all. Again we were struck dumb with surprise and something like fear,--and again Diana Chesney broke the silence.

"You call that simple!" she said, half petulantly.

"Quite so. Love and Death are the simplest things in the world"--replied Lucio.--"The ballad is a mere trifle,--it is ent.i.tled 'The Last Love-Song' and is supposed to be the utterance of a lover about to kill his mistress and himself. Such events happen every day,--you know that by the newspapers,--they are perfectly common-place----"

He was interrupted by a sharp clear voice ringing imperatively across the room--

"Where did you learn that song?"

XIV

It was the paralysed Countess who spoke. She had managed to partly raise herself on her couch, and her face expressed positive terror. Her husband hurried to her side,--and, with a curiously cynical smile on his lips, Rimanez rose from the piano. Miss Charlotte, who had sat rigidly upright and silent for some time, hastened to attend upon her sister, but Lady Elton was singularly excited, and appeared to have gained a sudden access of unnatural vigour.

"Go away,--I'm not ill,"--she said impatiently--"I feel better,--much better than I have done for months. The music does me good." And addressing her husband, she added--"Ask your friend to come and sit here by me,--I want to talk to him. He has a magnificent voice,--and--I know that song he sang,--I remember reading it--in a ma.n.u.script alb.u.m--long ago. I want to know where he found it--"

Rimanez here advanced with his gentle tread and courteous bearing, and Lord Elton gave him a chair beside the invalid.

"You are working miracles on my wife,"--he said--"I have not seen her so animated for years."

And leaving the two to talk, he crossed over to where Lady Sibyl, myself and Miss Chesney were all seated in a group, chatting more or less unrestrainedly.

"I have just been expressing the hope that you and your daughter will pay me a visit at Willowsmere, Lord Elton," I said.

His brows contracted a little, but he forced a smile. "We shall be delighted,"--he mumbled--"when do you take possession?"

"As soon as it is at all feasible"--I replied--"I shall wait in town till the next Levee is over, as both my friend and myself have arranged to be presented."