'
Is that it?" She lifted her face and looked up at him.
"Yes--yes--sing that!"
"I'm afraid I haven't got the music--can't play without the music."
He drew a deep breath. "That's a pity," he said.
"Well--listen--I'll sing this."
She placed the music before her on the rest, and with one hand on
the back of her chair, the other resting on the piano, he bent over
her, eyes wandering from the gold of her hair to the parting of her
lips as she sang. It was just such a song as he had asked for; filled
with the abandoned sentimentalism of decadent passion--
"Lord of my life, than whom none other shareth
The deep, red, silent wine that fills my soul--
Take thou and drain, till not one drop remaineth
To wet thy lips--then turn thou down the bowl.
"Lord of my heart--this boon I crave--this only,
That all my worth may be possessed by thee;
Make thou my life a chalice, drained, that lonely
Stands on the altar of Eternity."
She looked up at him as her fingers wandered to the final chord. His
lips were set in a thin line, and he was breathing quickly.
"Why did you sing that?" he asked.
She blindly shrugged her shoulders.
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