"Fairest of all most fair, Young Love, how comest thou Unto the soul? Still as the evening breeze Over the starry wave-- The moonlit wave--
"The heart lies motionless; So still, so sensitive; Love fans the breeze. Lo! at his lightest touch, The myriad ripples rise, And murmur on.
"And ripples rise to waves, And waves to rolling seas, Till, far and wide, The endless billows roll, In undulations long, For evermore!"
Her voice died away into a scarce audible tone, which sank into Brandon's heart, lingering and dying about the last word, with touching and unutterable melancholy. It was like the lament of one who loved. It was like the cry of some yearning heart.
In a moment Beatrice looked at Brandon with a swift, bright smile. She had sung these words as an artist. For a moment Brandon had thought that she was expressing her own feelings. But the bright smile on her face contrasted so strongly with the melancholy of her voice that he saw this was not so.
"Thus," she said, "Langhetti sang about it: and I have never forgotten his words."
The thought came to Brandon, is it not truer than she thinks, that "she loves him very dearly?" as she said.
"You were born to be an artist," he said, at last.
Beatrice sighed lightly. "That's what I never can be, I am afraid," said she. "Yet I hope I may be able to gratify my love for it. Art," she continued, musingly, "is open to women as well as to men; and of all arts none are so much so as music. The interpretation of great masters is a blessing to the world. Langhetti used to say that these are the only ones of modern times that have received heavenly inspiration. They correspond to the Jewish prophets. He used to declare that the interpretation of each was of equal importance. To man is given the interpretation of the one, but to woman is given the interpretation of much of the other. Why is not my voice, if it is such as he said, and especially the feeling within me, a Divine call to go forth upon this mission of interpreting the inspired utterances of the great masters of modern days?
"You," she continued, "are a man, and you have a purpose." Brandon started, but she did not notice it. "You have a purpose in life," she repeated. "Your intercourse with me will hereafter be but an episode in the life that is before you. I am a girl, but I too may wish to have a purpose in life--suited to my powers; and if I am not able to work toward it I shall not be satisfied."