"Look here, learning anything when you are out with that man Steering?"
"Yep."
"What, for instance?"
"Not to talk."
Madeira laughed carelessly. "You go and get Miss Madeira to sing, young Impudence," he said. "I'd just as soon hear the tenor, too. I am going to rest,"—he sighed deeply,—"I'm going to try to rest out here in the garden. I'd like some music."
Madeira went to the garden and stretched out on a bench, the smile that he had given Piney staying on his face, crinkling in automatically with the grievous strain that was about his eyes and mouth in these days. After a little he closed his eyes softly, enjoyingly. From the library came the carolling sweetness of Piney's tenor. And by and by, following it, soaring up with it, the glorious fulness of Salome Madeira's velvety soprano.
Bruce, far down the river road, heard, too.