Who can tell how rumor travels? When Regina made her appearance at the arsenal, the very women who had once been proud of her notice seemed hardly to remember a passing acquaintance with her; and, stung to the quick, she had barely strength to control her face and hold high her head till the door of her carriage had closed on her. She laid back her head, throbbing and aching, yet filled with a thousand plans for regaining her position and punishing those who had so humbled her.
It was one of Paul's restless days; and she heard him "storming" on the piano as her carriage entered the gateway. With sudden interest she raised her head, while her face grew animated with some struggling thought.
When night had set in, and the broad hall-door was thrown open to admit the soft breeze and the tender moonlight, Regina, for the first time since her return to the home of her childhood, approached the piano in the drawing-room and ran her fingers over the keys. The door stood open, and from her seat she could see into the hall, and catch a glimpse of Paul's shadow every time he passed the hall-door in his walk on the moonlit veranda. Not a muscle of her face moved as she continued in her play, striking chords and running _roulades_, without any apparent purpose save that of touching once more the old familiar key-board. Paul's shadow flitted by, regularly and restlessly, never varying an inch in his distance from the door as he passed it. Suddenly the chords melted into a melody low and sweet, yet swelling almost into wildness in its yearning, longing tenderness.
Regina listened intently, and--surely Paul could not have paused suddenly in his walk on the veranda! Directly his footsteps came again, halting and uncertain, and Regina repeated the air, throwing into it more intensity, even, than at first. She seemed absorbed in her playing, though she knew full well when Paul's hesitating footsteps crossed the threshold, and moved nearer the drawing-room entrance. When he stood in the door, she looked up, as though unwilling to be disturbed in her musical meditations. One look at the deathly-pale face, above which the dark blonde hair rose like a lion's mane, assured her that she would gain--_had_ gained--her end; and she played on, as though forgetting his presence in an instant. Presently, a hoarse, unsteady voice reached her ear: