DIARY--THE MUSIC MASTER
_September 19._
MY four days in Philadelphia have just been one exclamation point after
another! The most wonderful thing happened to me last night! Mrs. Lee
invited me over for dinner. I glided through the courses a little more
gracefully--one can learn if the will is there. I always loved dainty
things. I suppose that is why I delight in the Lee home and am eager to
adopt the ways of my new friends.
After dinner Mr. Lee played again. Of course I enjoyed that. When I
praised his playing he said he heard I'm a real genius and asked me to
sing for them. Mr. Krause, one of the best teachers of music in the
city, is a friend of Royal and Virginia thinks he would be the very one
to teach me. Mr. Lee wrote to Mr. Krause this summer and the music
teacher promised to take me for a pupil if I have a voice worth the
trouble. Virginia had prepared me for my meeting with him. Seems he's
queer, odd, cranky and painfully frank. But he knows how to teach music
so well that many would-be singers pray to be taken into his studio. Mr.
Lee said yesterday that Mr. Krause was expected home from his vacation
in a few days and then he'd arrange an interview. I trembled when he
said that. What if the great teacher did not like my voice!
To-night when Mr. Lee asked me to sing I selected a simple song. As I
sat down before the baby grand piano the words of the old song "Sweet
and Low" came to me. I would sing that until I gained courage and
confidence to sing a harder selection. I played from memory. As I sang I
was back again at home, singing to my father at the close of the day.
As the last words died on my lips and I turned on the chair a man, a
stranger to me, appeared in the room. He hurried unceremoniously to the
piano and greeted me, "You can sing!"
I stared at him. He was an odd-looking, active little man of about fifty
with keen blue eyes that bored into one like a gimlet.
Mr. Lee came toward us. "Mr. Krause," he exclaimed, and presented to me
the music master, the teacher for whom I had dreaded so to sing! I was
filled with inarticulate gladness.
"Mr. Krause," I cried, grasping his outstretched hand in my old
impetuous way, "do you mean it? Can I learn to sing?"
"I said so--yes. You can sing. You need to learn how to use your voice
but the voice is there."
"I'm so glad. I'll work----" I couldn't say any more. My joy was too
great to be expressed in words. I looked mutely into the wrinkled face
of the man.
"Royal said he had found a songbird," he went on smiling, "but I was
afraid he didn't know the difference between that and an owl--I see he
did. I'll be glad to have you for a pupil. Royal can bring you to my
studio to-morrow at eleven."
Mr. Krause stayed a while longer and the sitting-room was gay with
laughter and bright conversation. I think I heard little of it, though,
for the words, "You can sing!" kept ringing in my ears and crowding out
all other sounds.
I can sing! Mr. Krause has told me I can sing! And I will sing! Some day
all the world may stop to hear!