But, for all that, Jenny felt herself overawed by his dignity, as any
one would have been: there was something in the man so much greater
than his clothes, greater than his conscious, half-childish self.
Jenny's hands were raised to clap; but they dropped into her lap, lay
there, as, with a face set like marble, Ben turned and seated himself
at the piano. There was a moment's pause, while he stared straight in
front of him--such a pause that a feeling of goose-flesh ran down the
back of her arms--then he began to play.
Jenny had not even glanced at her programme; she would have understood
nothing of it if she had; but it gave the Sonata, Op. III, as the
opening piece.
Ben, however, took no notice of this; but, for some reason he could not
have explained, flung himself straight-way into the third item, the
tremendous "Hammerclavier."
The sounds flooded the hall; swept through it as if it were not there,
obliterating time and space. It was as though the Heavenly Host had
descended upon the earth, sweet, wonderful, and yet terrible, with a
sweep of pinions, deep-drawn breath--Tubal Cain and his kind, deified
and yet human in their immense masculinity and strength.
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