"Yes?" he said. "Oh yes, I've heard him sing. Not lately. He does
drawing-room ballads and all that sort of thing still, I suppose?"
"Have you ever heard him sing 'My love is like a glowing tulip that in
an old-world garden grows'?"
"I have not had that advantage," replied Sam stiffly. "But anyone can
sing a drawing-room ballad. Now something funny, something that will
make people laugh, something that really needs putting across ... that's
a different thing altogether."
"Do you sing that sort of thing?"
"People have been good enough to say...."
"Then," said Billie decidedly, "you must certainly do something at the
ship's concert to-morrow! The idea of your trying to hide your light
under a bushel! I will tell Bream to count on you. He is an excellent
accompanist. He can accompany you."
"Yes, but ... well, I don't know," said Sam doubtfully. He could not help
remembering that the last time he had sung in public had been at a
house-supper at school, seven years before, and that on that occasion
somebody whom it was a lasting grief to him that he had been unable to
identify had thrown a pat of butter at him.
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