Once upon a time, in a house by the sea, there lay an old woman—a special old woman, who had the gift of magic.
She said to her daughter, who sat near her bed, “I leave you this house, my dear. You do not need it now, but there will come a time when you will. And I want to leave something to each of my grandchildren. To the boy, I leave the gift of music—”
“But, Mother,” her daughter said gently, “there is no boy. There are just the two little girls.” She thought her mother’s illness had made her forget.
“There is no boy now,” the old woman agreed. “Soon, though, there will be. To him, the gift of music, although it may not do him much good, being as how he resembles his father. To one of my granddaughters I leave the gift of dance, and to the other—the one who looks like me—”
Her voice was fading, so she named the gift very softly, and her daughter, who loved her greatly, was weeping and did not hear.