do so, but the very nature of his duties made it necessary that
they should be thrown constantly together.

The music of the violins moved him and touched him deeply, and
stirred depths at which he had not guessed. It made him humble
and deeply grateful, and he felt how mean and unworthy he was
of such great happiness. He had never loved any woman as he felt
that he could love this woman, as he hoped that he was to love
her. For he was not so far blinded by her beauty and by what he
guessed her character to be, as to imagine that he really knew
her. He only knew what he hoped she was, what he believed the
soul must be that looked out of those kind, beautiful eyes, and
that found utterance in that wonderful voice which could control
him and move him by a word.

He felt, as he looked at the group before him, how lonely his own
life had been, how hard he had worked for so little--for what
other men found ready at hand when they were born into the world.

He felt almost a touch of self-pity at his own imperfectness; and
the power of his will and his confidence in himself, of which he
was so proud, seemed misplaced and little. And then he wondered
if he had not neglected chances; but in answer to this his
injured self-love rose to rebut the idea that he had wasted any
portion of his time, and he assured himself that he had done the
work that he had cut out for himself to do as best he could; no
one but himself knew with what courage and spirit. And so he sat
combating with himself, hoping one moment that she would
prove what he believed her to be, and the next, scandalized at
his temerity in daring to think of her at all.