Page:Marsh--The seen and the unseen.djvu/248

224 no doubt, unfair to Miss Martini, who is both a clever and a pretty girl. But then so many girls are pretty and clever nowadays—and nothing more. At last I found myself in next-door neighbourhood to Stephen Bensberg. Bensberg is an extraordinary man—one of the new kind of scientific doctors, with theories, and his eyes fixed, so to speak, on the next century but one. Among other things he is a musician, a fair performer on more than one instrument, and a keen critic—one of those critics who, in a composition or an artist, are always, as it were, looking for something which others cannot see.

"Anything worth staying for?" I inquired, when I saw that he was at my elbow.

"There is. A man named Goad."

"Goad! Who's he?"

"That I have not yet made up my mind about"

Something struck me in his tone.

"What do you mean?"

"I have not yet made up my mind if he is a genius or—something else." He stopped, as if hesitating. "But he is at least worth staying for. As a pianist he is, I fancy, original."

"Is he a new importation from the Fatherland?"

Bensberg smiled.

"No, he is English, although it was I who discovered him. He occupies rooms over those of a friend of mine. One day I was with my friend. I heard someone playing overhead. I took the liberty to listen. I took the further liberty to intrude upon his privacy, and to introduce myself to the performer. It was Goad. Here he is. You