"Try to get quiet, son. Count--like you always do. One--two--three--"
"Please, ma--for God's sake--please--please!"
"Look--such beautiful roses! From Sol Ginsberg, an old friend of papa's
he used to buy brasses from eighteen years ago. Six years he's been away
with his daughter in Munich. Such a beautiful mezzo they say, engaged
already for Metropolitan next season."
"I hate it, ma, if they breathe on my neck."
"Leon darlink, did mamma promise to fix it? Have I ever let you play a
concert when you wouldn't be comfortable?"
His long, slim hands suddenly prehensile and cutting a streak of upward
gesture, Leon Kantor rose to his feet, face whitening.
"Do it now! Now, I tell you. I won't have them breathe on me. Do you
hear me? Now! Now! Now!"
Risen also, her face soft and tremulous for him, Mrs. Kantor put out a
gentle, a sedative hand upon his sleeve.
"Son," she said, with an edge of authority even behind her smile, "don't
holler at me!"
He grasped her hand with his two and, immediately quiet, lay a close
string of kisses along it.
"Mamma," he said, kissing again and again into the palm, "mamma--mamma."
"I know, son; it's nerves!"
"They eat me, ma.
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