“Ask her to play the ‘Dance of the Dwarfs’ in the same suite—‘Peer Gint.’”
“Sit down,” said I, and felt as if I needed a seat myself.
The oafish tramp sat down on the porch seat, and I went in and told Cherry what the tramp would like to hear.
Surprise showed in her face, but quite as a matter of course she went to the piano and began the lumbering, humourous dance.
In the middle of it I could hear the tramp laughing gutturally, and when she had finished it he clapped his hands and said,
“Beg pardon, but I’m much obliged. That’s one of the funniest pieces of music that was ever composed. Say, boss, will you step out a minute.”
I stepped out. He had risen and was evidently going.
“Boss, I used to be one of the second violins in Seidl’s orchestra, but—well,—that’s how. I was go’n’ by here, for I had had som’n’ to eat at the last house, but when I heard ‘Anitra’s Dance,’ gee! it brought back the good old days when I was doing the only thing I ever cared for, fiddling; and I thought I’d ask for some more, and then I didn’t dare until I’d been around to the kitchen and braced up. Thank the young lady for me.”
He shuffled out to the road.
“You wronged him, Philip,” said Ethel when I returned. “Think of his knowing ‘Peer Gint.’”