"Perhaps," said Nevin. "Why do you ask?"
West smiled. Through his brain words were drumming, words that he remembered, words a man had whispered just before he died.
"I was just thinking," said West, "of what might happen if you should paint the wrong place sometime."
"By Lord," yelled Cartwright, "he's got you there, Nevin. The exact words I've been telling you."
Nevin started to rise from the table, and even as he did the rustling whisper of music filled the room. Music that relaxed Nevin's hands from their grip upon the table's edge, music that swept the sudden chill from between West's shoulderblades.
Music that told of keen-toothed space and the blaze of stars. Music that had the whisper of rockets and the quietness of the void and the somber arches of eternal night.
Rosie was singing.
West sat on the edge of his bed and knew that he had been lucky to break away before there could be more questions asked. So far, he was certain, he'd answered those they asked without arousing too much suspicion, but the longer a thing like that went on the more likely a man was to make some slight mistake.
Now he would have time to think, time to try to untangle and put together some of the facts as they now appeared.