n a
few minutes with a dog-eared bundle of sheets in her hand. From among
these she selected three and set them on the rack.

Benton whistled when he glanced over the music.

"The Siren Song," he grunted. "What is it? something new? Lord, look at
the scale. Looks like one of those screaming arias from the 'Flying
Dutchman.' Some stunt."

"Marchand composed it for the express purpose of trying out voices,"
Stella said. "It _is_ a stunt."

"You'll have to play your own accompaniment," Charlie grinned. "That's
too much for me."

"Oh, just so you give me a little support here and there," Stella told
him. "I can't sing sitting on a piano stool."

Benton made a face at the music and struck the keys.

It seemed to Stella nothing short of a miracle. She had been mute so
long. She had almost forgotten what a tragedy losing her voice had been.
And to find it again, to hear it ring like a trumpet. It did! It was too
big for the room. She felt herself caught up in a triumphant ecstasy as
she sang. She found herself blinking as the last note died away. Her
brother twisted about on the piano stool, fumbling for a cigarette.

"And still they say they can't come back," he remarked at last. "Why,
you're better than you ever were, Stella. You've got the old sweetness
and flexibility that dad used to rave about. But your voice is bigger,
somehow different. It gets under a man's skin."

She picked up the baby from the floor, began to play with him. She
didn't want to talk. She wanted to think, to gloat over and hug to
herself this miracle of her restored voice. She was very quiet, very
much absorbed in her own reflections until it was time--very shortly--to
put Jack Junior in his bed. That was a function she made wholly her own.
The nurse might greet his waking whimper in the morning and minister to
his wants throughout the day, but Stella "tucked him in" his crib every
night. And after the blue eyes were closed, she sat there, very still,
thinking. In a detached way she was conscious of hearing Charlie leave.

Later, when she was sitting beside her dressing table brushing her hair,
Fyfe came in. He perched himself on the foot rail of the bed, looking
silently at her. She had long grown used to that. It was a familiar
trick of his.

"How did it happen that you've never tried your voice lately?" he asked
after a time.

"I gave it up long ago," she said. "Didn't I ever tell you that I used
to sing and lost my voice?"

"No,"