hand as it lay clenched on the quilt beside him. What was it? Why had it been formed? Given those strange and delicate muscles—the power to draw music from the aching heart of the piano? That music was more real than the hand that made it. The hand was nothing, the body was nothing. The soul surely less than the grass. He lay as motionless as though the soul had indeed left the body.
After a time, the thought of music again came to him. He remembered something by a Russian composer, which his teacher had played to him. It had been too difficult for Finch to play, but he had the power of remembering it, of inwardly hearing it, in its entirety, as though it were again being played.
He lay, letting it sing through him, through every nerve in his body, like a cleansing, rushing wind. At last he felt peaceful and slept.
