"Sir?"

Tweany inclined his head toward the guitar. "Go on. I'm listening."

Completely ill at ease, Chad Lemming began to tell the stories and sing the ballads he had produced at the Coombses' apartment. "Well," he croaked halfheartedly, "I suppose you read in the newspapers the other day about President Eisenhower going to cut taxes. That caused me to do some thinking." Stammering, his voice faint, he began to sing.

Tweany, after watching a moment, imperceptibly returned to his magazine. There was no particular instant when he did so; the change was so gradual that Mary Anne could not follow it. Suddenly there was Tweany eating his sardine sandwich and studying an article on big-league baseball.

The others, filling up the doorway, listened and peeped into the kitchen. Lemming, with a shudder of abandon, knowing that he had failed, did a final raucous number about a library that either burned all its books or never had any books-Mary Anne couldn't tell. She wished he would stop; she wished he would go.

He was making a fool of himself and it goaded her to a fever pitch. By the time he had finished she wanted to scream aloud.

The silence that followed Lemming's performance was total. In the sink the monotonous dripping of a leaky faucet increased the sense of futility that hung over the room. Finally, with a grunt, Coombs elbowed his way in, swinging his flash camera.

"What's that?" Tweany asked, taking an interest.

"I want to get some pictures."

"Of what?" Tweany's voice took on a formal edge. "Of myself and Mr. Lemming?"

"That's correct," Coombs said. "Chad, get over beside him. Tweany, or whatever your name is, get up so you're both in the picture."

"I'm sorry, but I can't oblige," Tweany said. "My agent won't permit me to pose for publicity shots without his consent."

"What the hell agent is that?" Nitz demanded.

There was an uncomfortable pause, while Tweany went on with his meal and Chad Lemming stood unhappily beside the table.

"Forget it," Beth said to her husband. "Do as Mr. Tweany says."

Coombs, staring down at Tweany, suddenly complied. He flipped the lens cover over his camera, turned his back, and walked off. "The hell with it," he said, and mumbled a few words that nobody caught.

Hoisting up his guitar, Lemming departed from the room. Presently they heard the mournful noises from a long way off; he was curled up in the living room, playing to himself.

"Tweany," Mary Anne said, exasperated. "You ought to be ashamed of yourself."

Tweany raised an eyebrow, shrugged, and finished the remains of his sandwich. Brushing crumbs from his trousers, he arose and went over to the sink to rinse his hands. "What would you people care to drink? Beer? Scotch?"

They accepted scotch and, with their drinks, joined Lemming in the living room. The young man didn't look up; absorbed in his playing, he continued to crouch over his guitar.

"You play that pretty good," Nitz said sympathetically.

Lemming muttered a grateful, "Thanks."

"Maybe you ought to concentrate on that," Beth said, having ingested her cue from Tweany. "Maybe just the guitar would be better."

"I like that a lot better," Mary Anne said. "I can't see that talking."

In a quandary, Lemming protested: "But that's the whole point."

"Let it go," Beth said. Stalking around the untidy living room, she came upon the piano. No larger than a spinet, the piano was lost under heaps of magazines and clothing. "Do you play?" she asked Tweany.

"No. Sometimes Paul accompanies me. Practice."

"Not very often," Nitz said, wiping dust from the keyboard with his handkerchief. He struck a chord, expertly diminished it, and then lost interest. "You're going to have trouble getting this out of here," he remarked.

Instantly Mary Anne said: "Tweany isn't going anywhere."

"We got it up with ropes," Tweany said. "And we can get it down the same way. Through the kitchen window, if we have to."

"Where are you going?" Mary Anne demanded, panicstricken.

"Nowhere," Tweany answered.

"Tell her," Nitz said.

"There's nothing to tell. It's just an ... idea."

"Tweany's planning his big-time," Nitz said to the petrified girl. "He's moving along to L.A. Got an offer from Heimy Feld, the character who handles those jump concerts. Trial run at a bunch of test spots on Heimy's circuit."

"The word 'trial' never came up," Tweany corrected.

Seating herself at the piano, Beth started tapping out the G minor scale. A little island of sound came into being around her.

"Tweany," she said, with a toss of her hair, "I used to write songs. Did you know that?"

"No," Tweany said.

"She brought one along," Coombs said sourly. "She's going to trot it out and ask you to sing it."

At this, Tweany puffed up until he was even larger than usual. A bluish, steely nimbus shone out: a massive conceit. "Well," he said, "I'm always interested in new material."

Nitz belched.

As the sheet music was brought out of Beth's giant bag, Mary. Anne said to Nitz: "You should have told me."

"I waited."

"What for?" She couldn't understand.

"Until he was here. So he could answer."

"But," she said helplessly, "he didn't answer." She felt swamped by what was happening; her reality was drifting and she was unable to stop it. "He didn't say anything."

"That's what I mean," Nitz said. His voice sank down as Beth began to play. Tweany, standing behind her, leaned forward to catch the words. He had already entered a stage of rigid concentration; to him, music was a serious matter. Whatever trifle Beth had concocted was going to receive his full attention. There was an, innate grace that Mary Anne could not forget or ignore; belief in what he was doing added measure to the man's style.

"This song," Tweany intoned, "is called, 'Where We Sat Down,' and tells the story of a young woman walking through the countryside in autumn, remembering and visiting the places where she and her lover-now dead, killed in foreign lands-had been together. It is a simple song." And, taking a deep, meaningful breath, he sang the simple song.

"He doesn't usually do that," Nitz murmured as the song came to a finish. Beth began rippling out arpeggios and Tweany meditated over the enigma of existence. "It's hard to get him to do stuff on sight ... he likes to give it the once-over."

Beth was saying to the man standing beside her: "You felt it, didn't you?" Her playing took on volume and emotion. "You felt what I meant, in that."

"Yes," Tweany agreed, eyes half-shut, swaying with the music.

"And you brought it over. You realized it."

"It was a beautiful song," Tweany said, in a trance.

"Yes," Beth murmured, "it takes on a beauty. An almost terrifying beauty."

"'White Christmas,'" Nitz said, "that's the end of you. You're finished."

For the briefest interval Tweany wrestled with his composure. Then passion overcame him, and he turned from the piano. "Paul," he said, "a casual cruelty can do great harm."

"Only to a, sensitive soul," Nitz reminded him.

"This is my house. You're a guest in my house, at my invitation."

"Only the top floor." Nitz was pale and tense; he was no longer joking.

The strained silence grew until Mary Anne at last went over to Tweany and said: "We all should go."

"No," Tweany answered, his geniality returning.

"Paul," Mary Anne said to Nitz, "let's get out of here."

"Whatever you want," Nitz said.

At the piano, Beth played a series of runs. "Don't you want to wait for us? We'll give you a ride back."

"I meant," Mary Anne said to her, realizing that it was hopeless, "if we all left. All five of us together."

"That would be nice," Beth agreed. "Gosh, I can't imagine anything nicer." She made no move to get up, and her playing continued. In the corner, his legs drawn under him, Chad Lemming sorrowfully picked at his guitar, ignored by the rest of the group. His sounds, drowned out by the overpowering piano, dissolved and were lost.