Then she went back to the piano.

But Orde's mouth, could she have seen it, was set in grim lines, and
his feet, could she have heard them, rang on the pavement with quite
superfluous vigour. He turned to the left, and, without pause,
walked some ten or twelve miles.

The evening turned out very well, fortunately; Orde could not have
stood much more. They had the parlour quite to themselves. Carroll
took the cover from the tall harp, and, leaning her cheek against
it, she played dreamily for a half hour. Her arms were bare, and as
her fingers reached out lingeringly and caressingly to draw the
pure, golden chords from the golden instrument, her soft bosom
pressed against the broad sounding board. There is about the tones
of a harp well played something luminous, like rich, warm sunlight.
When the girl muted the strings at last, it seemed to Orde as though
all at once the room had perceptibly darkened. He took his leave
finally, his spirit soothed and restored.

Tranquillity was not for long, however. Orde's visits were,
naturally, as frequent as possible. To them almost instantly Mrs.
Bishop opposed the strong and intuitive jealousy of egotism. She
had as yet no fears as to the young man's intentions, but
instinctively she felt an influence that opposed her own supreme
dominance. In consequence, Orde had much time to himself. Carroll
and the rest of the family, with the possible exception of Gerald,
shared the belief that the slightest real opposition to Mrs. Bishop
would suffice to throw her into one of her "spells," a condition of
alarming and possibly genuine collapse. "To drive mother into a
spell" was an expression of the worst possible domestic crime. It