pleasure of listening to anybody else.

"And may I play for you, Miss Sylvia?" he asked.

"Yes, will you? Thanks, Lord Comber."

Hermann moved away.

"And so Mr. Hermann sits down by Lady Barbara while Lord Comber plays
for Miss Sylvia," he observed, with emphasis on the titles.

A sudden amazing boldness seized Michael.

"Sylvia, then," he said.

"All right, Michael," answered the girl, laughing.

She came and stood on the left of the piano, slightly behind him.

"And what are we going to have?" asked Michael.

"It must be something we both know, for I've brought no music," said
she.

Michael began playing the introduction to the Hugo Wolff song which
he had accompanied for her one Sunday night at their house. He knew it
perfectly by heart, but stumbled a little over the difficult syncopated
time. This was not done without purpose, for the next moment he felt her
hand on his shoulder marking it for him.

"Yes, that's right," she said. "Now you've got it." And Michael smiled
sweetly at his own amazing ingenuity.

Hermann put down the Variations, which he still had in his hand, when
Sylvia's voice began. Unaccustomed as she was to her accompanist, his
trained ear told him that she was singing perfectly at ease, and was
completely at home with her player. Occasionally she gave Michael some
little indication, as she had done before, but for the most part her
fingers rested immobile on his shoulder, and he seemed to understand
her perfectly. Somehow this was a surprise to him; he had not known that
Michael possessed that sort of second-sight that unerringly feels and
translates into the keys the singer's mood. For himself he always had to
attend most closely when he was playing for his sister, but familiar as
he was with her singing, he felt that Michael divined her certainly as
well as himself, and he listened to the piano more than to the voice.

"You extraordinary creature," he said when the song was over. "Where did
you learn to accompany?"

Suddenly Michael felt an access of shyness, as if he had been surprised
when he thought himself private.

"Oh, I've played it before for Miss--I mean for Sylvia," he said.

Then he turned to the girl.

"Thanks, awfully," he said. "And I'm greedy. May we have one more?"

He slid into the opening bars of "Who is Sylvia?" That song, since
he had heard her sing it at her recital in the summer, had grown in
significance to him, even as she had. It had seemed part