The morning call., 1894-05-06

drew her chair up to the fire.
..You are soaked through" said an
elderly lady, who was herself trying to get
roasted.
you ought to lose no time In changing
your clothes"
Il have not anything to change" said
the young girl. laughing. "Oh, l shall
soon be dry"
Have you lost all your luggage? asked
the lady. sympathetically.
No." said the young girl. Il had none
to lose" And she smiled little miscniev-
ously, as though she knew by instinct that
her companions sympathy would at once
degenerate into suspicion.
Il don't mean TO say I have not KNAPP
sack" she added, considerably. II have
walked long distance-in fact from a."
And where did you leave your compan-
ions?" asked the lady, with touch of for
giveness In her voice.
II am without companions, just as / am
without luggage" laughed the girl.
And then she opened the piano ard
struck few notes. There was something
carressing in the way in which she touched
the keys; whoever she was she knew how
to make sweet music; sad music. too, full
of that underlined longing, like the holding
out of ones arms 10 ones friends in the
hopeless distance.
The lady bending over the fire looked up
at the little girl ard forgot that she had
brought neither friends nor luggage with
her, She hesitated for one moment, and
she took the childish face between her
hands and kissed it.
THANK you. dear, for your music" she
said gently.
1.-The piano is terribly out of tune" said
the little girl, suddenly, and she ran out
of the room and came back carrying her
kDansack.
what are you going to do?" asked her
companion.
81 am going to tune the piano." the
little girl said; and she took tuning
hammer out of her knapsack and began
her work in real earnest She evidently
knew what she was about, and pegged
away at the notes as though her whole
life depended on the result
The lady by the fire was lost in amaze
ment. Who could she be? Without lug
gage and without friends, and with a
tuning-hammer!
Meanwh hile one of the gentlemen had
strolled into the salon: but, hearing the
sound of tuning, and being in secret pos
session of nerves, he fled, saying, "The
tuner, by Jove!"
A few minutes afterward Miss Blake.
whose nerves were no secret possession,
FASTENED into the salon, and, in her usual
imperious fashion, demanded instant ST.
lence.
Il have just DONE" said the little girl.
THE piano was so terribly out of tune l
could not resist the temptation"
Miss Blake, who never listened to what
any one said, took it for granted that the
little girl was the tuner for whom NJ. le
PrOpretaire had promised 10 send, and
having bestowed on her a condescending
nod, passed out into the garden, where she
told some of the visitors hat the piano had
been tuned at last and that the tuner was
a young woman of rather eccentric ap-
pearance.
"Really it is quite apominable how
women thrust themselves into every pro-
fession," she remarked, in her masculine
voice. 1T is so unfeminine-sO unseemIy"
There was nothing of the feminine about
Miss Blake. Her horse-cloth dress, her
waistcoat and hign collar aud her billy
cock bat were of the masculine genus
even her nerves could not be called femf-
nine, since we learn from two or three
doctors (aken off their guard that nerves
are neither feminine nor masculine, but
common.
II should like to see this tuner" said
one of the nis-players, leaning against
a tree.
"Here she comes" said Miss Blake, as
little girl was seen Sauntering into the
garden.
The men put I'D their eyeglasses and
saw little lady with childish face and
soft brown hair. of strictly feminine ap-
pearance and bearing. The goat came
toward her and began nibbing at her
frock She seemed to underst tand the
manner of goats and played with him to
his hearts content. One of the tennis
players, Oswald Everard by name. strolled
down to the bank whore she was having
her frOlic.
GOOD afternoon" he said. raising his
cap. "Ihope the goats not worrying You.
Pour little felowl This is his last day OF
play. He is to be killed tomorrow for table
d'hote."
what shame r' she said. Fancy to
be killed and then grumbled atp'
THAT is precisely what we do here" he
said, laughing. I'VE grumble at every
thing we eat. And own to being one of
the grumpiest, though the lady in the
horsecloth dress yonder follows close upon
my heels"
''She was the lady who was annoyed at
me because I tuned the piano." the little
girl said. ''Still il had to be done. 1t was
plainly my duty. seemed to have come
for that purpose"
at has been copfoundedly annoying
having il out of tune" he said. ''I've had
to give up singing altogether. But what a
strange pro fession you have chosen. Very
unusual, isn't it?"
"Why, surely not" she answered.
amused. 1T seems to me that every other
woman has taken to it. The wonder to me
is that any one ever scores success. Now
adays. however, DO one could amass a huge
fortune out of il"
No one. indeed!" replied Oswald Ev-
erard, laughing. what ON earth made
you take to it?"
'It took 10 me-" she said. simply. 1T
wrapt me round with enthusiasm. L could
think of nothing else l vowed that /
would rise TO the top Of my profession. |
worked day and night. But 1t means in
cesssnt toll for years if one wants to make
any headway."
''Good gracious! Thought it was merely
amatter of few months" he said. smiling
at the lItle girl.
ga few months" she repeated, scorn-
fully. "YoU are speaking the language of
an amateur. No; one has to work faith
fully year after year to grasp the possbili-
ties and pass on to greater possibilities.
You imagine what it must feel like to
touch the notes and know that you are
keeping tha listeners spelbound; that you
are taking them into fairy-land of sound,
where pretty personality is lost in vague
lDr, a