But you stay here,--the rocks are wet and slippery,--while I go up and play you a pretty tune." With that he clambered up the side of the cavern to a series of stalactites that presented somewhat the appearance of organ-pipes, and drew the handle of his hatchet across them, assuring his listener the while that he was playing a beautiful melody.

Blanka was expected to laugh at this, and had Manasseh only been there, she could have done so with a light heart.
"Don't you think this back wall looks like a stage curtain ?" Aaron went on.

"With a little stretch of the imagination you might take it for the curtain in the Kolozsvar theatre, with Apollo and the muses painted on it.

One feels almost like stamping one's feet, to make it go up and the play begin." But the undercurrent of the speaker's thoughts was quite different.

"What if Manasseh shouldn't come by noon--by nightfall ?" he was asking himself.