The director yielded, and drew up the engagement in duplicate. Ashmead
then borrowed the music and came back to the inn triumphant. He waved the
agreement over his head, then submitted it to her. She glanced at it,
made a wry face, and said, "Two months! I never dreamed of such a thing."
"Not worth your while to do it for less," said Ashmead. "Come," said he,
authoritatively, "you have got a good bargain every way; so sign."
She lifted her head high, and looked at him like a lioness, at being
ordered.
Ashmead replied by putting the paper before her and giving her the pen.
She cast one more reproachful glance, then signed like a lamb.
"Now," said she, turning fretful, "I want a piano."
"You shall have one," said he coaxingly. He went to the landlord and
inquired if there was a piano in the house.
"Yes, there is one," said he.
"And it is mine," said a sharp female voice.
"May I beg the use of it?"
"No," said the lady, a tall, bony spinster. "I cannot have it strummed on
and put out of tune by everybody."
"But this is not everybody. The lady I want it for is a professional
musician. Top of the tree."
"The hardest strummers going.
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