of her then,
but then she was a stranger. To-night it was even more intimately part
of her, and she was a friend.

Hermann strolled across to the fireplace at the end of this, and lit a
cigarette.

"My sister's a blatant egoist, Lady Barbara," he said. "She loves
singing about herself. And she lays it on pretty thick, too, doesn't
she? Now, Sylvia, if you've finished--quite finished, I mean--do come
and sit down and let me try these Variations--"

"Shall we surrender, Michael?" asked the girl. "Or shall we stick to the
piano, now we've got it? If Hermann once sits down, you know, we shan't
get him away for the rest of the evening. I can't sing any more, but we
might play a duet to keep him out."

Hermann rushed to the piano, took his sister by the shoulders, and
pushed her into a chair.

"You sit there," he said, "and listen to something not about yourself.
Michael, if you don't come away from that piano, I shall take Sylvia
home at once. Now you may all talk as much as you like; you won't
interrupt me one atom--but you'll have to talk loud in certain parts."

Then a feat of marvellous execution began. Michael had taken an evil
pleasure in giving his master, for whom he slaved with so unwearied a
diligence, something that should tax his powers, and he gave a great
crash of laughter when for a moment Hermann was brought to a complete
standstill in an octave passage of triplets against quavers, and the
performer exultantly joined in it, as he pushed his hair back from his
forehead, and made a second attempt.

"It isn't decent to ask a fellow to read that," he shouted. "It's a
crime; it's a scandal."

"My dear, nobody asked you to read it," said Sylvia.

"Silence, you chit! Mike, come here a minute. Sit down one second and
play that. Promise to get up again, though, immediately. Just these
three bars--yes, I see. An orang-outang apparently can do it, so why
not I? Am I not much better than they? Go away, please; or, rather, stop
there and turn over. Why couldn't you have finished the page with the
last act, and started this one fresh, instead of making this Godforsaken
arrangement? Now!"

A very simple little minuet measure followed this outrageous passage,
and Hermann's exquisite lightness of touch made it sound strangely
remote, as if from a mile away, or a hundred years ago, some graceful
echo was evoked again. Then the little dirge wept for the memories
of something that had never happened, and leaving out