So one evening as he stood by her piano, he said all at once:
"By the bye, Miss Raymount, last night, as I was turning over some songs
I wrote many years ago, I came upon one I thought I should like you just
to look at--not the music--that is worth nothing, though I was proud
enough of it then and thought it an achievement; but the words I still
think are not so bad--considering. They are so far from me now that I am
able to speak of them as if they were not mine at all!"
"Do let me see them!" said Hester, hiding none of the interest she felt,
though fearing a little she might not have to praise them so much as she
would like.
He took the song from his pocket, and smoothed it out before her on the
piano.
"Read it to me, please," said Hester.
"No; excuse me," he answered with a little shyness, the rarest of
phenomena in his spiritual atmosphere; "I _could_ not read it
aloud. But do not let it bore you if--"
He did not finish his sentence, and Hester was already busy with his
manuscript.
Here is the song:
If thou lov'st I dare not ask thee,
Lest thou say, "Not thee;"
Prythee, then, in coldness mask thee,
That it _may_ be me.
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