"

They opened the door and stepped back, the laughing confusion of their
blinking entrance, blinded by the lights, carrying off the first moments
of greeting. In the midst of this, Vincent heard the front door open
and, startled to think that anyone else had used that exit, turned his
head, and saw with some dismay that 'Gene had followed them in. How
near had he been to them in the black night while they talked of his
wife's mismated beauty? He walked past them giving no sign, his strong
long arms hanging a little in front of his body as he moved, his
shoulders stooped apparently with their own weight. From the dining-room
came a sound which Vincent did not recognize as the voice of any
instrument he had ever heard: a series of extraordinarily rapid staccato
scrapes, playing over and over a primitively simple sequence of notes.
He stepped to the door to see what instrument was being used and saw an
old man with a white beard and long white hair, tipped back in a chair,
his eyes half shut, his long legs stretched out in front of him, patting
with one thick boot. Under his chin was a violin, on the strings of
which he jiggled his bow back and forth spasmodically, an infinitesimal
length of the horse-hair being used for each stroke, so that there was
no sonority in the tones. Vincent gazed at him with astonishment. He had
not known that you could make a violin, a real violin, sound like that.

Old Mrs. Powers said at his elbow, "The first sets are forming, Mr.
Marsh." She called across to Frank Warner, standing very straight with
Nelly Powers' hand on his arm, "Frank, you call off, wun't ye?"

Instantly the young man, evidently waiting for the signal, sent out a
long clear shout, "First sets _fo-orming!_"

Vincent was startled by the electrifying quality of the human voice when
not hushed to its usual smothered conversational dullness.

"Two sets formed in the living-room! Two in the dining-room! One in the
far room!" chanted Frank. He drew a deep breath which visibly swelled
his great chest and sang out, resonantly, "Promenade _to_ your places!"

He set the example, marching off through the throng with Nelly by his
side.

"Frank, he generally calls off," explained old Mrs. Powers. "It's in
his family to. His father always did before him." She looked around her,
discerned something intelligible in what looked like crowding confusion
to Vincent and told him hurriedly, "Look-y-here, we'll have to git a
move on, if w