My efforts so far had been exactly that: a tremendous, dizzying amount of slow and steady. I was pleased that Mr Itadori was concerned about me, but I needed more. I ran after him as he was nearing the door.

‘But how should I be slow and steady? How do you do slow and steady the right way?’ I stood in his way, trying to catch my breath.

Mr Itadori gave me a quizzical look. ‘There’s no standard in this job that tells you if something is right or not,’ he said. ‘Best to be wary of that word “right”.’

His friendly round face nodded a few times, as though in agreement with himself. He pushed open the door that led out to the car park. ‘Just take everything as it comes, slow and steady.’

I lingered and held the door for him, wanting to make sure he had no other gems of wisdom to offer.

‘Don’t try to run before you can walk,’ he said.

So slowly and steadily, whenever I had the chance, I would tune the pianos in the showroom. One piano per day. After tuning all six I’d go back to the first and retune it, changing the pitch. It’d be at least six months more before I’d be allowed to tune a client’s piano by myself, but to my comfort I learned that my predecessor had taken even longer. He’d been with the company for a year and a half before being let loose on clients’ personal instruments.

It was Mr Yanagi, my senior in the firm by seven years, who had filled me in. ‘That student had done the full course at a piano tuners’ training school,’ he said. ‘Some people are just better suited to it than others.’

It was terrifying to think that no matter how hard I tried there was a chance that I might never make it to the end.

‘What’s important for a tuner is more than just your actual tuning technique,’ Mr Yanagi said, patting my arm with his stubby-fingered hand.

I wasn’t confident of my own technique. I’d graduated from a rigorous training course, but had only just mastered the basics. When I had to work on a piano that hadn’t been properly maintained, the best I could manage was to rearrange the frequency of the discordant sounds and align the scales. No one would ever call my results beautiful. This was all I was capable of and it gave me sleepless nights. With no conviction in even my most basic skills, there was no way I could accomplish the finer aspects of tuning.

Perhaps sensing my unease, Mr Yanagi broke into a smile. ‘Don’t worry about it. Just be bold. Nobody’s going to trust a tuner who seems uncertain.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘No need to apologize. So long as you appear to know what you’re doing, you’ll be just fine.’