"That's what Joan said--Joan is my sister," she continued. "But I guess
it's so cold this afternoon I had to bring a muff along. If my fingers
are stiff I can't play, and then Herr Becker is angry." But she
laughed again as she spoke, and it was plain that the master's wrath
did not exactly incite fear. "Joan always comes along, but to-day
she's sick."

"Will you let me help you?" asked Maurice, and a moment later he was
walking at her side.

She handed over music and violin to him without a trace of hesitation;
and, as they went along the PROMENADE, she talked to him with as
little embarrassment as though they were old acquaintances. It was so
kind of him to help her, she thought; she couldn't imagine how she
would ever have got home without him, alone against the wind; and she
was perfectly sure he must be American--no one but an American would be
so nice. When Maurice denied this, she laughed very much indeed, and
was not sure, this being the case, whether she could like him or not;
as a rule, she didn't like English people; they were stiff and horrid,
and were always wanting either to be introduced or to shake hands.
Here she carried her muff up to her lips again, and her eyes shone
mischievously at him over the dark velvet. Maurice had never known
anyone so easily moved to laughter; whenever she spoke she laughed,
and she laughed at everything he said.

Off the PROMENADE, where the trees were of a marvellous Pale green,
they turned into a street of high spacious houses, the dark lines of
which were here and there broken by an arched gateway, or the delicate
tints of a spring garden. To a window in one of the largest houses