Mrs. Batty said 'Ah!' with meaning, and Henrietta tried to sit
straighter on the seductive settee. She could not allow Mrs. Batty to
utter insinuating ejaculations and, raising her voice, she said:

'Mr. Batty, do play something.'

Charles Batty gazed at her over the shining surface of the grand piano
and looked remarkably like an owl, an owl that had lost its feathers.

'Something? What?'

'Charles!' exclaimed Mrs. Batty.

'Oh, I don't know,' Henrietta murmured. She could think of nothing but
a pictorial piece of music her mother had sometimes played on the
lodging-house piano, with the growling of thunder-storms, the
twittering of birds after rain and a suggestion of church bells, but
she was determined not to betray herself.

'Whatever you like.'

He broke into a popular waltz, playing it derisively, yet with
passion, so that Mrs. Batty's ponderous head began to sway and
Henrietta's feet to tap. He played as though his heart were in the
dance, and to Henrietta there came delightful visions, thrilling
sensations, unaccountable yearnings. It was like the music she had
heard at the theatre, but more beautiful. Her eyes widened, but she
kept them lowered, her mouth softened and she caught her lip.

'Now I call that lovely,' Mrs. Batty said, with the last chord. His