And she soon noticed something else that drew her to Joe.  Almost every evening he would sit down at his piano and start playing idly.  As a rule he played dance music, popular songs from Broadway.  But sometimes leaning back he would drift into other music.  And though his hand would bungle and only sketch it, so to speak—­in his black eyes, scowling slightly over the smoke of his cigar, would come a look which Ethel liked.  But vaguely she felt that Amy did not, that it even made her uneasy.  For almost invariably at such times, Amy would come behind him, her plump softly rounded arm would find its way down over his shoulder—­and little by little the music would change and would come back to Broadway.

When Joe heard one evening that Ethel was “mad to learn to sing,” he took her by the arm at once and marched her over to the piano.  And they had quite a session together—­till Amy suggested going out to a new cabaret she had heard of that day.  Her voice sounded hurt and strained.  And Ethel from that night on dropped all mention of singing.

Her curiosity deepened toward this city love affair, this husband and wife who apparently had left so many things out of their lives, things vital in the Ohio town.  The sober wee girl in the nursery kept just as quiet as before.  Often Ethel opened that door and went in and tried to make friends with its grave shy little inmate and the hostile nurse.  And returning to her room she would frown and wonder for a time.  But the pretty things piling in from the shops, and the gay anticipations, soon crowded such questioning out of her mind.  Swiftly this household was growing more real, the rooms familiar, intimate; the day’s routine with its small events were becoming parts of her life.  Her own room was familiar now, for by many touches she’d made it her own.  And the dining-room and the living room, where she grew acquainted with Joe, these too assumed an intimate air.  Most of all, her sister’s room grew more and more vivid in her thoughts, though this was still far from familiar, It held too much, it meant too much.

“Shall I ever live with a man like that?”

The way they looked at each other at times!  The way they seemed keeping watch on each other.  If Joe were out very late at night, Amy would almost invariably grow uneasy and absentminded, and there would be a challenging note in the way she greeted him on his return.  On one such occasion Ethel was in Amy’s room.  She went out when Joe came in; but a queer little gasping sigh behind gave her a start and a swift thrill, for although she did not turn around she knew they were in each other’s arms.  And again, late one afternoon when the sisters came home and found Joe at work with a tired anxious look on his face, his wife came up behind him.  And the picture of her small gloved hand upon Joe’s heavy shoulder remained in Ethel’s memory.  It seemed so soft and yet so strong.

“She can do anything with him she likes.  When I marry somebody how will it be?”