She stood behind him, and by a finger on his
shoulder directed him in the way she would have him go. Michael found
himself suddenly and inexplicably understanding this; her finger, by its
pressure or its light tapping, seemed to him to speak in a language that
he found himself familiar with, and he slowed down stroking the notes,
or quickened with staccato touch, as she wordlessly directed him.
Out of all these things, which were but trivialities, pleasant,
unthinking hours for all else concerned, several points stood out for
Michael, points new and illuminating. The first was the simplicity of it
all, the spontaneousness with which pleasure was born if only you took
off your clothes, so to speak, and left them on the bank while you
jumped in. All his life he had buttoned his jacket and crammed his hat
on to his head. The second was the sense, indefinable but certain, that
Hermann and Sylvia between them were the high priests of this memorable
orgie.
He himself had met, at dreadful, solemn evenings when Lady Ashbridge and
his father stood at the head of the stairs, the two eminent actors who
had romped to-night, and found them exceedingly stately personages, just
as no doubt they had found him an icy and awkward young man.
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