gay tone; "she will sleep until evening, if I like; when I stop playing,
the silence awakens her."

"I beg of you, continue to play; never awaken her," said Gerfaut; and, as
if he were afraid his wish would not be granted, he began to pound in the
bass without being disturbed by the unmusical sounds.

"Do not play discords," said Clemence, laughing; "let us at least put her
to sleep in tune."

She was wrong to say us; for her lover took this as complicity for
whatever might happen. Us, in a tete-a-tete, is the most traitorous word
in the whole language.

It may be that Clemence had no great desire that her aunt should awaken;
perhaps she wished to avoid a conversation; perhaps she wished to enjoy
in silence the happiness of feeling that she was still loved, for since
he had seated himself beside her Octave's slightest action had become a
renewed avowal. Madame de Bergenheim began to play the Duke of
Reichstadt's Waltz, striking only the first measure of the accompaniment,
in order to show her lover where to put his fingers.

The waltz went on. Clemence played the air and Octave the bass, two of
their hands remaining unoccupied--those that were close to each other.
Now, what could two idle hands do, when one belonged to a man deeply in
love, the other to a young woman who for some time had ill-treated her
lover and exhausted her severity? Before the end of the first part, the
long unoccupied, tapering fingers of the treble were imprisoned by those
of the bass, without the least disturbance in the musical effect--and the
old aunt slept on!