"Say, Molly, I don't see what difference it makes."
"Difference what makes, James?" Mrs. Harrigan raised her eyes from her work. James had been so well-behaved that morning it was only logical for her to anticipate that he was about to abolish at one fell stroke all his hard-earned merits.
"About eating salads. We never used to put oil on our tomatoes. Sugar and vinegar were good enough."
"Sugar and vinegar are not nourishing; olive-oil is."
"We seemed to hike along all right before we learned that." His guardian angel was alert this time, and he returned to his delving without further comment. By and by he got up. "Pshaw!" He dropped the wearisome volume on the reading-table, took up a paper-covered novel, and turned to the last fight of the blacksmith in _Rodney Stone_. Here was something that made the invention of type excusable, even commendable.
"Play the fourth _ballade_," urged Abbott.
Celeste was really a great artist. As an interpreter of Chopin she had no rival among women, and only one man was her equal. She had fire, tenderness, passion, strength; she had beyond all these, soul, which is worth more in true expression than the most marvelous technique. She had chosen Chopin for his brilliance, as some will chose Turner in preference to Corot: riots of color, barbaric and tingling. She was as great a genius in her way as Nora was in hers. There was something of the elfin child in her spirit. Whenever she played to Abbott, there was a quality in the expression that awakened a wonderment in Nora's heart.
As Celeste began the _andante_, Nora signified to the Barone to drop his work. She let her own hands fall. Harrigan gently closed his book, for in that rough kindly soul of his lay a mighty love of music. He himself was without expression of any sort, and somehow music seemed to stir the dim and not quite understandable longing for utterance. Mrs. Harrigan alone went on with her work; she could work and listen at the same time. After the magnificent finale, nothing in the room stirred but her needle.
"Bravo!" cried the Barone, breaking the spell.
"You never played that better," declared Nora.
Celeste, to escape the keen inquiry of her friend and to cover up her embarrassment, dashed into one of the lighter compositions, a waltz. It was a favorite of Nora's. She rose and went over to the piano and rested a hand upon Celeste's shoulder. And presently her voice took up the melody. Mrs. Harrigan dropped her needle. It was not that she was particularly fond of music, but there was something in Nora's singing that cast a temporary spell of enchantment over her, rendering her speechless and motionless. She was not of an analytical turn of mind; thus, the truth escaped her. She was really lost in admiration of herself: she had produced this marvelous being!