He captured Sylvia’s hand again.

“And what is more he saw me, so to speak,” he said.  “He realised that I had an existence independent of him.  I used to be a—­a sort of clock to him; he could put its hands to point to any hour he chose.  Well, he has realised—­he has really—­that I am ticking along on my own account.  He was quite respectful, not only to me, which doesn’t matter, but to you—­which does.”  Michael laughed, as he plaited his fingers in with hers.

“My father is so comic,” he said, “and unlike most great humourists his humour is absolutely unconscious.  He was perfectly well aware that I meant to marry you, for I told him that last Christmas, adding that you did not mean to marry me.  So since then I think he’s got used to you.  Used to you—­fancy getting used to you!”

“Especially since he had never seen me,” said the girl.

“That makes it less odd.  Getting used to you after seeing you would be much more incredible.  I was saying that in a way he had got used to you, just as he’s got used to my being a person, and not a clock on his chimney-piece, and what seems to have made so much difference is what Aunt Barbara told him last night, namely, that your mother was a Tracy.  Sylvia, don’t let it be too much for you, but in a certain far-away manner he realises that you are ‘one of us.’  Isn’t he a comic?  He’s going to make the best of you, it appears.  To make the best of you!  You can’t beat that, you know.  In fact, he told me to ask if he might come and pay his respects to your mother to-morrow.

“And what about my singing, my career?” she asked.

Michael laughed again.

“He was funny about that also,” he said.  “My father took it absolutely for granted that having made this tremendous social advance, you would bury your past, all but the Tracy part of it, as if it had been something disgraceful which the exalted Comber family agreed to overlook.”

“And what did you say?”

“I?  Oh, I told him that, of course, you would do as you pleased about that, but that for my part I should urge you most strongly to do nothing of the kind.”

“And he?”

“He got four inches taller.  What is so odd is that as long as I never opposed my father’s wishes, as long as I was the clock on the chimney piece, I was terrified at him.  The thought of opposing myself to him made my knees quake.  But the moment I began doing so, I found there was nothing to be frightened at.”

Sylvia got up and began walking up and down the long room.

“But what am I to do about it, Michael?” she asked.  “Oh, I blush when I think of a conversation I had with Hermann about you, just before Christmas, when I knew you were going to propose to me.  I said that I could never give up my singing.  Can you picture the self-importance of that?  Why, it doesn’t seem to me to matter two straws whether I do or not.  Naturally, I don’t want to earn my living by it any more, but whether I sing or not doesn’t matter.  And even as the words are in my mouth I try to imagine myself not singing any more, and I can’t.  It’s become part of me, and while I blush to think of what I said to Hermann, I wonder whether it’s not true.”