"Do you want anything, dear ?" "Have you almost finished ?" The girl's voice would almost have told that she was blind.

It was sweet and low, but it lacked life; though not weak, it was uncertain in strength and full of a longing that could never be satisfied, but that often seemed to come within possible reach of satisfaction.

There was in the tones, too, the perpetual doubt of one from whom anything might be hidden by silence, or by the least tarn of words.

Every passing hope and fear, and every pleasure and pain, were translated into sound by its quick changes.

It trusted but could not always quite promise to believe; it swelled and sank as the sensitive heart beat faster or slower.