"It's not talking--it's only stuttering and stammering on the piano,"
she apologized.

Dr. Linton laughed. Her remark had evidently pleased him. He always
liked a pupil who fell in with his humor.

"You've the elements of speech in you, though you're still in the
prattling-baby stage," he conceded. "It's something, at any rate, to
find there's material to work upon. Some people wouldn't make musicians
if they practised for a hundred years. We've got to alter your
touch--your technique's entirely wrong--but if you're content to
concentrate on that, we'll soon show some progress. You'll have to stick
to simple studies this term: no blazing away into M'Dowell and
Rachmaninoff yet awhile."

"I'll do anything you tell me," agreed Ingred humbly.

Dr. Linton's manner might be brusque, but he seemed prepared to take an
interest in her work. He was known to give special pains to those whose
artistic caliber appealed to him. In his opinion pupils fell under two
headings: those who had music in them, and those who had not. The
latter, though he might drill them in technique, would never make really
satisfactory pianists; the former, by dint of scolding or cajoling,
according to his mood at the moment, might derive real benefit from his
tuition, and become a credit to him. It was a by-word in the school that
his favorites had the stormiest lessons.

"I'm thankful I'm not a pet pupil," declared Fil, whose playing was
hardly of a classical order. "I should have forty fits if he stalked