“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 the number he disapproved of, as reminiscent of the Handel theme, Hermann gathered himself up again for the assertion of the original tune, with its bars of scale octaves.  The contagious jollity of it all seized the others, and Sylvia, with full voice, and Aunt Barbara, in a strange hooting, sang to it.

Then Hermann banged out the last chord, and jumped up from his seat, rolling up the music.

“I go straight home,” he said, “and have a peaceful hour with it.  Michael, old boy, how did you do it?  You’ve been studying seriously for a few months only, and so this must all have been in you before.  And you’ve come to the age you are without letting any of it out.  I suppose that’s why it has come with a rush.  You knew it all along, while you were wasting your time over drilling your toy soldiers.  Come on, Sylvia, or I shall go without you.  Good night, Lady Barbara.  Half-past ten to-morrow, Michael.”