"I never could understand this thing of getting up before you are
obliged to," added Henrietta plaintively.
But Sophie seemed well satisfied, particularly when Mr. Langenau came in
and I looked down into my cup of tea, instead of saying good-morning to
him. He did not say very much, though there was a good deal of babble
among the others, principally about his music.
It was becoming the fashion to be very attentive to him. He was made to
promise to play in the evening; to bring down his books of music for the
benefit of Miss Henrietta, who wanted to practice, Heaven knows what of
his. His advice was asked about styles of playing and modes of
instruction; he was deferred to as an authority. But very little he
seemed to care about it all, I thought.
CHAPTER VII.
THREE WEEKS TOO LATE.
_Qui va a la chasse perd sa place_.
_De la main a la bouche se perd souvent la soupe_.
Distance all value enhances!
When a man's busy, why, leisure
Strikes him as wonderful pleasure.
Faith! and at leisure once is he,
Straightway he wants to be busy.
_R. Browning_.
Two weeks more passed: two weeks that seem to me so many years when I
look back upon them. Many more walks, early and late, many evenings of
music, many accidents of meeting. It is all like a dream. At seventeen
it is so easy to dream! It does not take two weeks for a girl to fall in
love and make her whole life different.
It was Saturday evening, and Richard was expected; Richard and Kilian
and Mr. Eugene Whitney. Ah, Richard was coming just three weeks
too late.
We were all waiting on the piazza for them, in pretty toilettes and
excellent tempers. It was a lovely evening; the sunset was filling the
sky with splendor, and Charlotte and Henrietta had gone to the corner of
the piazza whence the river could be seen, and were murmuring fragments
of verses to each other. They were not so much absorbed, however, but
that they heard the first sound of the wheels inside the gate, and
hurried back to join us by the steps.
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