"You came from the South?"
"Georgy, ma'am."
"Georgia! So did I! We should be friends," she said, and, smiling, held out her hand. Tom Osby took it.
"Ma'am," said he, gravely, "I'm right glad to see you. I've not been back home for a good many years. I've been all over."
"Nor have I been home," said she, sadly. "I've been all over, too. But now, what brought you here? Tell me, did you want to see me?"
"Yes!" Tom Osby answered simply. "I said that's why I come!"
"You want me to come up to Heart's Desire to sing? Ah, I wish that were not impossible."
"No, there's no one sent me," said Tom Osby. "Though, of course, the boys would do anything for you they could. What we want in Heart's Desire—why, sometimes I think it's nothing, and then, again, everything. Maybe we didn't want any music; and then, again, maybe we was just sick and pinin' for it, and didn't know it."
She looked at him intently as he bent his head, his face troubled. "Listen," said he, at length, "I'll tell you all about it. Up at Vegas I heard a funny sort of singin' machine. It had voices in it. Ma'am, it had a Voice in it. It—it sung—" he choked now.
"And some of the songs?"