“The gramophone?”
“Of course. You can buy a small one and a few dance records—”
“Splendid,” I cried, “and if you bring it off and teach me to dance, the gramophone is yours as an honorarium. Agreed?”
I brought it out very pat, but scarcely from the heart. I could not picture the detested instrument in my study among my books, and I was by no means reconciled to the dancing either. It had been in my mind that I might try how it went for a while, though I was convinced that I was too old and stiff and would never learn now. And to go at it hammer and tongs as she proposed seemed to me altogether too sudden and uncompromising. As an old and fastidious connoisseur of music, I could feel my gorge rising against the gramophone and jazz and modern dance-music. It was more than anyone could ask of me to have dance tunes that were the latest rage of America let loose upon the sanctum where I took refuge with Novalis and Jean Paul and to be made to dance to them. But it was not anyone who asked it of me. It was Hermine, and it was for her to command, and for me to obey. Of course, I obeyed.
We met at a café on the following afternoon. Hermine was