might yet find a fair wi--"

With such a stamp came Darrell's foot upon the floor that the holy and
conjugal monosyllable dropping from Fairthorn's lips was as much cut in
two as if a shark had snapped it. Unspeakably frightened, the poor man
sidled away, thrust himself behind a tall reading-desk, and, peering
aslant from that covert, whimpered out, "Don't, don't now, don't be so
awful; I did not mean to offend, but I'm always saying something I did
not mean; and really you look so young still "(coaxingly), "and, and--"

Darrell, the burst of rage over, had sunk upon a chair, his face bowed
over his hands, and his breast heaving as if with suppressed sobs.

The musician forgot his fear; he sprang forward, almost upsetting the
tall desk; he flung himself on his knees at Darrell's feet, and exclaimed
in broken words, "Master, master, forgive me! Beast that I was! Do look
up--do smile or else beat me--kick me."

Darrell's right hand slid gently from his face, and fell into Fairthorn's
clasp.

"Hush, hush," muttered the man of granite; "one moment, and it will be
over."

One moment! That might be but a figure of speech; yet before Lionel had
finished half the canto that was plunging him into fairyland, Darrell was
standing by him with his ordinary tranquil mien; and Fairthorn's flute
from behind the boughs of a neighbouring lime-tree was breathing out an
air as dulcet as if careless Fauns still piped in Arcady, and Grief were
a far dweller on the other side of the mountains, of whom shepherds,