“--I can’t think what you want playing about with boys.... Girls should stick to girls....” And he pulled off his boots and flung them loudly under the sofa.... Hr-rooch--flop ... Hr-rooch--flop ... and then his collar--plock, plock.... “A girl of your age,” he went on, “ought not to bother her head with fellers ... this sort of free-and-easy-carrying-on won’t do, Catherine....” And--“I can’t see what you need ever to be out later than nine for ... you’ve got all the daytime. I can’t think what you want the night as well for ... it’s not as if you weren’t allowed to do what you like on Saturday afternoons....” And her mother, shrill and cacophonous: “When _I_ was young----” Chorus of father and mother: “When _I_ was young----” § 5 It must be a dream. If she ever had children of her own, would she say to them: “When _I_ was young----” She pondered.... CHAPTER XIX AFTERWARDS § 1 UNFORTUNATELY her illness, whilst not serious in itself, left her with neuritis in her right arm. Until she should be rid of this, any restarting of concert work was out of the question. To play even a hymn tune with her right hand fatigued her, and all scale and arpeggio work was physically impossible. When she was quite recovered from all save the neuritis, she spent most of her time either reading or practising the left-hand parts of various concert pieces. This latter exercise, whilst not very entertaining to her in the musical sense, consoled her with the thought that her time was not being entirely wasted, and that when her right hand should come into use again her playing would be all the better for this intensive development of her left. Every day she visited a masseuse in the West-end and received an electric treatment for her arm which Dr. McPherson recommended.