"The composer's
name is Mr. Dodd," said she, quietly.
"I little thought you would be satisfied with it," replied David,
obliquely.
"Then you doubted my judgment as well as your own talent."
"My talent! I should never have composed an air that would bear
playing but for one thing."
"And what was that?" said Lucy, affecting vast curiosity. She felt
herself on safe ground now--the fine arts.
"You remember when you went away from Font Abbey, and left us all so
heavy-hearted?"
"I remember leaving Font Abbey," replied Lucy, with saucy emphasis,
and an air of lofty disbelief in the other incident.
"Well, I used to get my fiddle, and think of you so far away, and
sweet sad airs came to my heart, and from my heart they passed into
the fiddle. Now and then one seemed more worthy of you than the rest
were, and then I kept that one."
"You mean you took the notes down," said Lucy coldly.
"Oh no, there was no need; I wrote it in my head and in my heart. May
I play you another of your tunes? I call them your tunes."
Lucy blushed faintly, and fixed her eyes on the ground. She gave a
slight signal of assent, and David played a melody.
"It is very beautiful," said she in a low voice. "Play it again. Can
you play it as we walk?"
"Oh yes." He played it again. They drew near the hall door. She looked
up a moment, and then demurely down again.
"Now will you be so good as to play the first one twice?" She listened
with her eyelashes drooping.
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