and the echoing piano. If you had it in
you to give reality to great and simple things, it was surely a waste
to concern yourself with these little morbid, melancholy manikins, these
marionettes. But his emotions being unoccupied he attended more to the
manner of the performance, and in especial to the marvellous technique,
not so much of the singer, but of the pianist who caused the rain to
fall and the waters reflect the toneless grey skies. He had never, even
when listening to the great masters, heard so flawless a comprehension
as this anonymous player, incidentally known as Hermann, exhibited. As
far as mere manipulation went, it was, as might perhaps be expected,
entirely effortless, but effortless no less was the understanding of the
music. It happened. . . . It was like that.

All of this so filled Michael's mind as he travelled down that evening
to Ashbridge, that he scarcely remembered the errand on which he went,
and when it occurred to him it instantly sank out of sight again, lost
in the recollection of the music which he had heard to-day and which
belonged to the art that claimed the allegiance of his soul. The rattle
of the wheels was alchemised into song, and as with half-closed eyes he
listened to it, there swam across it now the full face of the singer,
now the profile of the pianist, that had stood out white and intent
against the dark panelling behind his head. He had gleaned one fact at
the box-office as he hurried out to catch his train: this Hermann was
the singer's brother, a teacher of the piano in London, and apparently
highly thought of.

CHAPTER III

Michael's train, as his mother had so infallibly pronounced, was late,
and he had arrived only just in time to hurry to his room and dress
quickly, in order not to add to his crimes the additional one of
unpunctuality, for unpunctuality, so Lord Ashbridge held, was the
politeness not only of kings, but of all who had any pretence to decent
breeding. His father gave him a carefully-iced welcome, his mother
the tip of her long, camel-like lips, and they waited solemnly for the
appearance of Aunt Barbara, who, it would seem, had forfeited her claims
to family by her marriage. A man-servant and a half looked after each
of them at dinner, and the twelve Lord Ashbridges in uniform looked down
from their illuminated frames on their degenerate descendant.

The only bright spot in this portentous banquet was Aunt Barbara, who
had chosen that even