he desk, her hair clutched in one hand, her pen in the other. At the
window Robbie Belle was working happily over her curve-tracing, now and
then drawing back to gaze with admiration at the sweeping lines of her
problem. Once the slanting beat of the drops against the pane caught her
eye, and she paused for a moment to consider their angle of incidence.
She decided that she liked curves better than angles. She did not wonder
why, as Berta would have done, but having recognized the fact of
preference turned placidly back to her instruments.

Splash! came a fiercer gust of rain, and Berta stirred uneasily, tossing
her head as if striving subconsciously to shake off a vague irritation of
hearing. Another heavier sound was mingling with the steady patter.
Rub-a-dub-dub, rub-a-dub-dub! Robbie Belle glanced up and listened, her
pencil uplifted.

"It's Bea," she said, "she's drumming with her knuckles on the floor in
the corridor. She says that it is against her principles to knock on the
door when it has an engaged sign on it. Shall I say come?"

Apparently Berta did not hear the question. With her chin grasped firmly
in one fist, she was staring very hard at a corner of the ceiling where
there was nothing in particular. Robbie looked at her and sighed, but the
resignation in the sigh was transfigured by loving awe. She picked up her
pencil in patient acquiescence. Berta must not be disturbed.

"Chir-awhirr, chir-awhirr, tweet, tweet, tweet!" It was Bea's best
soprano, with several extra trills strewn between the consonants. "Listen
to the mocking-bird. Oh, the mocking-bird is singing on the bough. Bravo,
encore! Chir-awhirr! Encore!

"'Make me over, Mother April,
When the sap begins to stir.
When thy flowery hand delivers
All the mountain-prisoned rivers,
And thy great heart throbs and quivers
To revive the joys that were,
Make me over, Mother April,
When the sap begins to stir.'"

Robbie Belle was leaning back in her chair to listen in serene enjoyment.
She loved to hear Bea sing. Berta was listening, too, but with an absent
expression, as if still in a dream.

The voice outside the door declared itself again. "Ahem, written by Bliss
Carmen. Sung by Beatrice Leigh. Ahem!" It was a noticeably emphatic ahem,
and certainly deserved a more appreciative reply than continued silence
from