"Mostly trash, too," assented the Major; "Tosti's is the best, but even there one is all battered to pieces before the end."
"That is true," put in Marjory, eagerly. "You see, the poet begins by fine-drawing the agony, the composer follows suit, and the singer carries out the distortion. So in the third verse there is nothing for it but to 'kill the coo.'"
"I haven't heard 'Auld Robin Gray' for twenty years," murmured Lord George. "No one sings anything but German nowadays. German or comic operas."
"Miss Carmichael sings Scotch songs; I've heard her," said Paul from the skein of silk he was holding for Alice Woodward.
"Oh, do!" cried the Moth. "Something touching."
"Somethin' to cheer us up, you mean," put in Sam; "somethin' with a chorus, you know."
"Something old-fashioned," protested Lord George.
"Something appropriate to the occasion," suggested his wife.
"Something Miss Carmichael approves of," came from the skein of silk.
The girl stood by the piano for an instant, looking at them all with a touch of fine scorn in her face.