"Once, when I was very young—your age, maybe . . . I went to a school that taught such skills. The only school for music on my planet. A colonial world, you see, not much time for the arts. There was a competition—the winner was to travel to Earth, and have a recording career. Which he subsequently did. But the recording company underwriting the affair was only interested in the very best. I came in second. There is room for so very few . . ." Her voice faded in a sigh. "I was left with a pleasing personal accomplishment that no one wanted to listen to. Not when they had only to plug in a disc to hear not just the best from my world, but the best in the galaxy. Fortunately, I met Warren about then. My permanent patron and audience of one. Probably as well I wasn't trying to make a career of it; we moved so often in those days, when he was finishing school and starting work with GalacTech. I've done some teaching here and there, to interested antiquarians . . ." She tilted her head at Silver. "And did they teach you any music, with all the things they've been teaching you up on that satellite?"

"We learned some songs when we were little," said Silver shyly. "And then there were the flute-toots. But they didn't last long."

"Flute-toots?"

"Little plastic things you blew in. They were real. One of the crèche mothers brought them up when I was about, oh, eight. But then they sort of got all over the place, and people were complaining about the, um, tooting. So she had to take them all back."

"I see. Warren never mentioned the flute-toots." Madame Minchenko's eyebrows quirked. "Ah . . . what sort of songs?"

"Oh . . ." Silver drew breath, and sang, "Roy G. Biv, Roy G. Biv, he's the color quaddie that the spectrum gives; Red-orange-yellow, green and blue, indigo, violet, all for you—" she broke off, flushing. Her voice sounded so wavery and weak, compared to that astonishing violin.

"I see," said Madame Minchenko in a strangely choked voice. Her eyes danced, though, so Silver didn't think she was offended. "Oh, Warren," she sighed, "the things you have to answer for . . ."

"May I," Silver began, and stopped. Surely she would not be permitted to touch that lavish antique. What if she forgot to hold onto it for a moment and the gravity pulled it from her hands?

"Try it?" Madame Minchenko finished her thought. "Why not? We appear to have a little time to kill, here."

"I'm afraid—"

"Tut. Oh, I used to protect this one. It sat unplayed for years, locked up in climate-controlled vaults . . . dead. Then of late I began to wonder what I was saving it for. Here, now. Raise your chin, so; tuck, so," Madame Minchenko curled Silver's fingers around the violin's neck. "What nice long fingers you have, dear. And, er . . . what a lot of them. I wonder . . ."