He heard Paderewski play Chopin, and became a crazy lover of the piano. He hired a small upright and studied finger exercises. He consulted a thousand books on technic, and in the meantime could not play Czerny's velocity studies.
He grew thin, and sought the advice of many pianists. He soon found that pressing your foot on the swell and pulling couplers for tone colour were not the slightest use in piano playing. Subtle finger pressures, the unloosening of the muscles, the delicate art of nuance, the art unfelt by many organists, all were demanded of the pianist, and Pinton almost despaired.
He grew contemptuous of the king of instruments as he essayed the C major invention of Bach. He sneered at stops and pedals, and believed, in his foolish way, that all polyphony was bound within the boards of the Well-Tempered Clavichord. Then the new alto came to the choir, and Pinton—at being springtide, when the blood is in the joyful mood—thought that he was in love. He was really athirst.
This Friday evening he was genuinely disappointed and thirsty. He turned with a sinking heart and parched throat into Pop Pusch's dearly beloved resort. Earlier in his life he had often solaced himself with the free lunch that John, the melancholy waiter, had dispensed. Pinton's mind was a prey to many emotions as he entered the famous old place. He sat down before a brown table and clamoured for amber beer.
He was not alone at the table. As Pinton put the glass of Pilsner to his lips he met the gaze of two sardonic eyes. He could not finish his glass. He returned the look of the other man and then arose, with a nervous jerk that almost upset the table.
"Sit down, old pal; don't be crazy. I'll never say a word. Sit down, you fool; don't you see people are looking at you?"
The voice was low, kindly in intonation, but it went through Pinton like a saw biting its way into wood.
He sat down all in a heap. He knew the eyes; he knew the voice. It was the owner of the dark lantern—the mysterious man in the other house of that last Saturday night. Pinton felt as if he were about to become ill.
"Lord, but you are a nervous one!" said the other, most reassuringly. "Sit still and I'll order brandy. It will settle your stomach."
That brought Pinton to his senses at once.