As they went up the Hirschengasse they could hear him pursuing his unsteady way down the street and singing lustily. At the door of the Pension Schwarz Harmony paused.
"Do you mind if I ask one question?"
"You honor me, madam."
"Then--what is the name of the girl back home?"
Peter Byrne was suddenly conscious of a complete void as to feminine names. He offered, in a sort of panic, the first one he recalled:-"Emma."
"Emma! What a nice, old-fashioned name!" But there was a touch of disappointment in her voice.
Harmony had a lesson the next day. She was a favorite pupil with the master. Out of so much musical chaff he winnowed only now and then a grain of real ability. And Harmony had that. Scatchy and the Big Soprano had been right--she had the real thing.
The short half-hour lesson had a way with Harmony of lengthening itself to an hour or more, much to the disgust of the lady secretary in the anteroom. On that Monday Harmony had pleased the old man to one of his rare enthusiasms.
"Six months," he said, "and you will go back to your America and show them how over here we teach violin. I will a letter--letters--give you, and you shall put on the programme, of your concerts that you are my pupil, is it not so?"
Harmony was drawing on her worn gloves; her hands trembled a little with the praise and excitement.
"If I can stay so long," she answered unsteadily.
"You must stay. Have I so long labored, and now before it is finished you talk of going! Gott im Himmel!"
"It is a matter of money. My father is dead. And unless I find something to do I shall have to go back."
The master had heard many such statements. They never ceased to rouse his ire against a world that had money for everything but music. He spent five minutes in indignant protest, then:-"But you are clever and young, child. You will find a way to stay. Perhaps I can now and then find a concert for you." It was a lure he had thrown out before, a hook without a bait. It needed no bait, being always eagerly swallowed. "And no more talk of going away. I refuse to allow. You shall not go."
Harmony paid the lady secretary on her way out. The master was interested. He liked Harmony and he believed in her. But fifty Kronen is fifty Kronen, and South American beef is high of price. He followed Harmony into the outer room and bowed her out of his studio.