“Here’s something called the Livery Stable Blues. Do you know it? I don’t.” You put it on, and a dreadful yowling fills the air. She covers her ears.
“Stop it!” she cries. “Take it off! Imagine dancing to that.”
“Oh gosh! Here’s Peggy O’Neill! That has plenty of memories for me, all right. She turned me down the same evening.”
“I’m so sorry, but you were too young to be getting married anyway. Look at this? I wonder why no one ever broke it. I think they played it at my first Prom. It’s queer, but the only people I remember at parties are perfectly irrelevant ones; people I just have one dance with, or something. This is having a very bad effect on me. I feel so old and regretful.” She sighs and looks in the mirror hanging on the wall.
“Well then,” say, winding up the machine again, “Listen to this and have a real good cry. You weren’t born yet when they were playing it.” Start to sing with the music. “Oh, tell me, pretty maiden, are there any more at home like you? There are a few—kind sir——”
“I never even heard it,” she says. “It’s quite catchy, too. They had a lot of good songs, in their way. What are you doing? You’ll get all dusty.”
You are struggling with a large pile of Red Seals. “Sometimes they have a waltz or something that you can use in these highbrow things,” shuffling them. “Here’s something; Valse Bluette. It might be good; let’s try to dance to it.”
But the rhythm is too varied for you. You struggle for a while, and then she breaks away, laughing and breathless.
“No good,” she says. “But here’s one of my favorites. Do you mind? Wait a minute.”
John McCormick’s voice rings out richly, marred only by a periodic scratch.
“When-n-n the dawwwn Flames innnn the skyeeeeee I—uh—love—uh youuuuuu: Whennnn the birrrrdlings wake and cryeeeee I—uh—love—uh yououuuuooooo.”
“Isn’t that lovely?” she says, raptly. “I always loved that song. Music always GETS me somehow. Let’s play it again.”
“Wait a minute,” you say. “I have something else.” The sweet strains of Liebestraum make the air sticky, and her ready laughter is stilled in reverence.
Say, “I don’t know if you’ll like this one or not. It’s a long one.”
She sits down on the divan. “Sure. Go ahead. What is it? I don’t remember any of them.”