^[2]Bach thinks enough of this conception to bring it back later for an encore . The rising line, having appeared first in the bass and then in the middle voice, now appears in the soprano, thus completing an upward cycle through the fugue's voices. In ending this cycle with a literally crowning statement of the line, Bach has saved its optimal appearance for last. Similarly, the sustained notes are now in the voice where they sound best, the bass. (A sustained note on the harpsichord fades more slowly when played on one of its lower, more resonant strings.) The subject—the fugue's nominal star—is relegated to the recessive middle voice. Leave it to Bach, however, to make a virtue of this relatively hidden positioning. He does so, paradoxically, by hiding the subject's first few notes the more, within an episode-ending cadence. Only after this cadence, when the texture becomes simpler, do we realize that a subject statement is underway, as though the thinning of a crowd has revealed an acquaintance who was present all along . The subtlety of the effect is beyond praise, as is the craftsmanship—the seamless overlapping of the episode's ending and the subject's beginning—that underlies it.