The
stranger, hoping so also, opened the door and closed it again behind
her.
"Tell me," laughed Miss Devine, who by sheer force of talent was
contriving to wring harmony from the reluctant piano, "how did you
manage to do it? I should like to know."
"How did I do what?" inquired the stranger.
"Contrive to get rid so quickly of those two old frumps?"
"How well you play!" observed the stranger. "I knew you had genius
for music the moment I saw you."
"How could you tell?"
"It is written so clearly in your face."
The girl laughed, well pleased. "You seem to have lost no time in
studying my face."
"It is a beautiful and interesting face," observed the stranger.
She swung round sharply on the stool and their eyes met.
"You can read faces?"
"Yes."
"Tell me, what else do you read in mine?"
"Frankness, courage--"
"Ah, yes, all the virtues. Perhaps. We will take them for granted."
It was odd how serious the girl had suddenly become. "Tell me the
reverse side."
"I see no reverse side," replied the stranger. "I see but a fair
girl, bursting into noble womanhood."
"And nothing else? You read no trace of greed, of vanity, of
sordidness, of--" An angry laugh escaped her lips. "And you are a
reader of faces!"
"A reader of faces." The stranger smiled. "Do you know what is
written upon yours at this very moment? A love of truth that is
almost fierce, scorn of lies, scorn of hypocrisy, the desire for all
things pure, contempt of all things that are contemptible--especially
of such things as are contemptible in woman.
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