“And I,” said Schneidermann, “have never been. I am a musician....” Ellen laughed scornfully and he turned to her with a curious blushing look of self-effacement, “Perhaps,” he said, “dilettante is a better word.”
For a time they talked—the stupid, polite conversation that occurs between strangers; and then, the proprieties satisfied, Ellen and Paul drifted quickly back into the realm of music. Lily devoted herself to Willie Harrison.
“It was too bad,” he remarked, “about the house at Cypress Hill.”
Lily leaned forward on the table holding up one white wrist to shield her eyes from the light of the candles. “Yes,” she said. “I’m sorry ... sentimentally, I suppose. I should never have gone back to it. It was perfectly useless to me. But I’m sorry it’s gone. I suppose it, too, was changed.”
“You would never have known it,” said Willie. “It was completely black ... even the white trimmings.” He leaned forward confidentially. “Do you know what they say? They say in the Town that some one was hired to burn it, so that you would be willing to sell.”
For a moment Lily remained silent. Her hand trembled a little. She looked across at Ellen to see whether she had been listening. Her cousin was plainly absorbed in her argument.
“They can have it now,” said Lily, with an intense bitterness. “I begrudge them even the taxes I have to pay on it. But they’ll have to pay a good price,” she added quietly. “I’ll squeeze the last cent out of them.”
It was the end of their conversation, for Willie glancing at his watch, announced that he must leave. Lily accompanied him up the long stairs to the unpretentious door. There he hesitated for a moment on bidding her good night.
“You have changed,” he said. “I can see it now.”
Lily smiled vaguely, “How?”