When she had finished, Clara turned to Jonah with a languid smile, the look of the artist conscious of divine gifts.
"My daughter was considered the best player at the convent where she was educated," said the Duchess--"a great talent wasted in this dreadful place." "I niver 'eard anythin' like that in my natural," said Jonah with enthusiasm.

"If yer can teach Ray ter play like that, I'm satisfied." "You may depend upon her doing her best with your son, but it is not everyone who has Clara's talent," said the Duchess.
"Play some more," said Ray.
This time she selected a grand march, striking the dilapidated piano a series of stunning blows with both hands, filling the air with the noise of battle.
"That must be terrible 'ard," said Jonah.
"It takes it out of one," replied Clara, with the simplicity of an artist.
Then she gave Ray his first lesson, showing him how to sit and place his hands, anxious to impress the parent that she was a good teacher.
She declared that Ray was very apt, and would learn rapidly.

An hour later, Jonah paid for Ray's first quarter.

Clara's terms were a guinea, but Jonah insisted on two guineas on the understanding that Ray would receive special attention.
But in spite of her promises, Ray's progress was slow.

As Jonah had no piano, the boy came half an hour early to his lesson to practise, but the twenty minutes' journey from the Silver Shoe occupied the best part of an hour, for Ray, who took to the streets as a duck takes to water, could spend a morning idling before shop windows, following fiddlers on their rounds, watching navvies dig a drain, with a frank, sensuous delight in the sights and sounds of the streets, an inheritance from Jonah's years of vagabondage.