play it this time. I'm going to teach you to play it! I shall be going
back to the city before long, and then what will you do when you want to
hear it? Perhaps you couldn't keep the tune in your head. I'm going to
show you an easy way to play it--just the air. I shall have to try it
myself first, of course. But I'm sure you can learn how, if you'll
practice faithfully." It was queer how her music-teacher tone crept back
into her voice. She laughed to herself to hear it. "Practice faithfully"
sounded so natural to say!

She sat down at the organ and experimented thoughtfully, trying to
reduce the old man's beloved tune to its very lowest terms. After quite
a long time she nodded and smiled.

Then began Old '61s music lessons. It was terrible work, like earning a
living with the sweat of the brow. But the two of them--the young woman
and the old man--bent to it heroically. For an hour, that first time,
the cramped old fingers felt their way over the keyboard; for an hour
Billy bent over them, patiently pointing the way. She had forgotten that
she was not to think of piano-notes now--that she had signed the Wicked
Compact. She had forgotten everything but her determination to teach Old
'61 to play "Marching through Georgia." And Old '61 had, in his turn,
forgotten things--that he was old, alone, a cumberer, everything but his
determination to learn It.

It was not a scientific lesson. It did not begin with first principles
and creep slowly upward; it began in the middle, in a splendid,
haphazard, ambitious way. The stiff old hands were gently placed in
position for the first notes of the tune, the stiff old fingers were
pressed gently down, one at a time. Over and over and over the process
was repeated. It was learning by sheer brute patience and love.