She was slender, at any rate, and very fragile beside the courtly Wilhelm . When she began her immortal song, one felt that she was right for the part, the pure lyric soprano that suits it best, and in her voice there was something fresh and delicate, like deep wood flowers. “ Connais-tu-le-pays ”—it stirred one like the odours of early spring, recalled the time of sweet, impersonal emotions.
When the curtain fell on the first act, St. Peter turned to his wife.
“A fine cast, don’t you think? And the harps are very good. Except for the woodwinds, I should say it was as good as any performance I ever heard at the Comique.”
“How it does make one think of Paris, and of so many half-forgotten things!” his wife murmured. It had been long since he had seen her face so relaxed and reflective and undetermined.
Through the next act he often glanced at her. Curious, how a young mood could return and soften a face. More than once he saw a starry moisture shine in her eyes. If she only knew how much more lovely she was when she wasn’t doing her duty!
“My dear,” he sighed when the lights were turned on and they both looked older, “it’s been a mistake, our having a family and writing histories and getting middle-aged. We should have been picturesquely shipwrecked together when we were young.”
“How often I’ve thought that!” she replied with a faint, melancholy smile.
“You? But you’re so occupied with the future, you adapt yourself so readily,” he murmured in astonishment.
“One must go on living, Godfrey. But it wasn’t the children who came between us.”