Boyce sat still for a long time, listening to the echoes which this music had awakened in his soul. He retired, at length, content, but determined that upon the morrow he would watch—the day being Sunday—for the musician who had so moved and taught him.
He arose early, therefore, and having prepared his own simple breakfast of fruit and coffee, took his station by the window to watch for the man. For he felt convinced that the exposition he had heard was that of a masculine mind. The long, hot hours of the morning went by, but the front door of the house next to his did not open.
“These artists sleep late,” he complained. Still he watched. He was too much afraid of losing him to go out for dinner. By three in the afternoon he had grown impatient. He went to the house next door and rang the bell. There was no response. He thundered another appeal. An old woman with a cloth about her head answered the door. She was very deaf, and Boyce had difficulty in making himself understood.
“The family is in the country,” was all she would say. “The family will not be home till September.”
“But there is some one living here?” shouted Boyce.
“I live here,” she said with dignity, putting back a wisp of dirty gray hair behind her ear. “It is my house. I sublet to the family.”
“What family?”
But the old creature was not communicative.
“The family that lives here,” she said.
“Then who plays the piano in this house?” roared Boyce. “Do you?”