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Rh lilac bushes in the next yard and the fresh sweet smell swirled around her like a host of silent bees. She was stung with beauty.

Suddenly she heard steps on the porch next door. She glanced up casually to find a pair of keen blue eyes looking at her. The house had been empty for a long while, and June knew that someone had moved in from down the street. This was the first she had seen of the new family. She had heard a baby crying, heard a woman’s voice sighing once in a while, “Oh Gawd” or “Oh that brat,” from the room which faced the Henreddy dining-room and opened on an air shaft and she had heard a violin whining and exulting now and then, late in the afternoon.

This man who caused such a shudder to shoot through her was Mr. Armand, as she found out afterward, who played in the symphony orchestra. Neighbors on the other side of the street knew him and his family because they had lived there for fifteen years. His wife had sung as a soloist before he married her, they said. He had fallen in love with her three summers before. She didn't ever sing any more. All she did was wheel the baby up and down the street and sew some tiny garments which were far too small for the child which she held in her arms. Mother Grace had seen her and said succinctly, “Another coming? Oh Lord, three small children in two adjoining houses!”