5/11 Confound bowling, anyhow! It was a dull and uninteresting game. He cared less for it as time went on, he found; less to-night than ever. He crept away into the dim and deserted parlor and sat down at the piano, the only friend in which he cared to confide just then. He played, with a queer lingering touch which had something of hesitation in it, and which reduced all music to a succession of soft chords, _The Maid of Dundee_ and _Annie Laurie_, _The Banks of Banna_ and _The Last Rose of Summer_, then one of the simpler nocturnes of Chopin, and, following these, a quaint, slow melody which was like all of the others and yet like none. She did not explain why she had relented, but came directly into the room and stood at the end of the piano. |