Miss Lind, in spite of her sensible views as to talking shop, was not interested in the least. “Indeed!” she said. “How interesting that must be! But how did you find time to become so perfect a musician, and to sing so exquisitely?”
“I picked most of it up when I was a boy. My grandfather was an Irish sailor with such a tremendous voice that a Neapolitan music master brought him out in opera as a buffo. When he had roared his voice away, he went into the chorus. My father was reared in Italy, and looked more Italian than most genuine natives. He had no voice; so he became first accompanist, then chorus master, and finally trainer for the operatic stage. He speculated in an American tour; married out there; lost all his money; and came over to England, when I was only twelve, to resume his business at Covent Garden. I stayed in America, and was apprenticed to an electrical engineer. I worked at the bench there for six years.”
“I suppose your father taught you to sing.”
“No. He never gave me a lesson. The fact is, Miss Lind, he was a capital man to teach stage tricks and traditional renderings of old operas; but only the exceptionally powerful voices survived his method of teaching. He would have finished my career as a singer in two months if he had troubled himself to teach me. Never go to Italy to learn singing.”
“I fear you are a cynic. You ought either to believe in your father or else be silent about him.”
“Why?”
“Why! Surely we should hide the failings of those we love? I can understand now how your musical and electrical tastes became mixed up; but you should not confuse your duties. But please excuse me:” (Conolly’s eyes had opened a little wider) “I am lecturing you, without the least right to. It is a failing of mine which you must not mind.”
“Not at all. Youve a right to your opinion. But the world would never get on if every practical man were to stand by his father’s mistakes. However, I brought it on myself by telling you a long story. This is the first opportunity I ever had of talking about myself to a lady, and I suppose I have abused it.”
Marian laughed. “We had better stop apologizing to one another,” she said. “What about the accompaniments to our next songs?”
Meanwhile Marmaduke and Miss McQuinch were becoming curious about Marian and Conolly.
“I say, Nelly,” he whispered, “Marian and that young man seem to be getting on uncommonly well together. She looks sentimentally happy, and he seems pleased with himself. Dont you feel jealous?”
“Jealous! Why should I be?”
“Out of pure cussedness. Not that you care for the electric man, but because you hate any one to fall in love with any one else when you are by.”
“I wish you would go away.”
“Why? Dont you like me?”
“I loathe you. Now, perhaps you understand me.”
“That’s a nice sort of thing to say to a fellow,” said Marmaduke, roused. “I have a great mind to bring you to your senses as Douglas does, by not speaking to you for a week.”
“I wish you would let me come to my senses by not speaking to me at all.”
“Oh! Well, I am off; but mind, Nelly, I am offended. We are no longer on speaking terms. Look as contemptuous as you please: you will be sorry when you think over this. Remember: you said you loathed me.”
“So I do,” said Elinor, stubbornly.
“Very good,” said Marmaduke, turning his back on her. Just then the concertinists returned from the platform, and a waiter appeared with refreshments, which the clergyman invited Marmaduke to assist him in dispensing. Conolly, considering the uncorking of bottles of soda water a sufficiently skilled labor to be more interesting than making small talk, went to the table and busied himself with the corkscrew.
“Well, Nelly,” said Marian, drawing her chair close to Miss McQuinch, and speaking in a low voice, “what do you think of Jasper’s workman?”
“Not much,” replied Elinor, shrugging her shoulders. “He is very conceited, and very coarse.”
“Do you really think so? I expected to find you delighted with his unconventionality. I thought him rather amusing.”
“I thought him extremely aggravating. I hate to have to speak to people of that sort.”
“Then you consider him vulgar,” said Marian, disappointed.
“N — no. Not vulgarer than anybody else. He couldnt be that.”
“Sherry and soda, Marian?” said Marmaduke, approaching.
“No, thank you, Marmaduke. Get Nelly something.”
“As Miss McQuinch and I are no longer on speaking terms, I leave her to the care of yonder scientific amateur, who has just refused, on teetotal grounds, to pledge the Rev. George in a glass of eighteen shilling sherry.”
“Dont be silly, Marmaduke. Bring Nelly some soda water.”
“Do nothing of the sort,” said Miss McQuinch.
Marmaduke bowed and retired.
“What is the matter between you and Duke now?” said Marian.
“Nothing. I told him I loathed him.”
“Oh! I dont wonder at his being a little huffed. How can you say things you dont mean?”
“I do mean them. What with his folly, Sholto’s mean conceit, George’s hypocrisy, that man’s vulgarity, Mrs. Fairfax’s affectation, your insufferable amiability, and the dreariness of those concertina people, I feel so wretched that I could find it in my heart to loathe anybody and everybody.”
“Nonsense, Nelly! You are only in the blues.”
“Only in the blues!” said Miss McQuinch sarcastically. “Yes. That is all.”
“Take some sherry. It will brighten you up.”
“Dutch courage! Thank you: I prefer my present moroseness.”
“But you are not morose, Nelly.”
“Oh, stuff, Marian! Dont throw away your amiability on me. Here comes your new friend with refreshments. I wonder was he ever a waiter? He looks exactly like one.”
After this the conversation flagged. Mrs. Fairfax grew loquacious under the influence of sherry, but presently a reaction set in, and she began to yawn. Miss McQuinch, when her turn came, played worse than before, and the audience, longing for another negro melody, paid little attention to her. Marian sang a religious song, which was received with the respect usually accorded to a dull sermon. The clergyman read a comic essay of his own composition, and Mrs. Fairfax recited an ode to Mazzini. The concertinists played an arrangement of a quartet by Onslow. The working men and women of Wandsworth gaped, and those who sat near the door began to slip out. Even Miss McQuinch pitied them.
“The idea of expecting them to be grateful for an infliction like that!” she said. “What do people of their class care about Onslow’s quartets?”
“Do you think that people of any class, high or low, would be gratified by such an entertainment?” said Conolly, with some warmth. No one had sufficient spirit left to reply.
At last the concertinists went home, and the reading drew to a close. Conolly, again accompanied by Marian, sang “Tom Bowling.” The audience awoke, cheered the singer heartily, and made him sing again. On his return to the greenroom, Miss McQuinch, much affected at the fate of Bowling, and indignant with herself for being so, stared defiantly at Conolly through a film of tears. When Marmaduke went out, the people also were so moved that they were ripe for laughter, and with roars of merriment forced him to sing three songs, in the choruses of which they joined. Eventually the clergyman had to bid them go home, as Mr. Lind had given them all the songs he knew.