Clark is a young man making his start in Boston, having moved there from Red Willow County, Nebraska. He is sensitive and reflective, maintaining a deep appreciation for art and music. Having spent his childhood as an awkward, bashful farm boy, he feels profound gratitude and affectionate pity toward his aunt, who educated him during his youth.

Georgiana is Clark's elderly, frail aunt who lives a demanding life on a homestead in Red Willow County, Nebraska. Thirty years prior, she was a music teacher at the Boston Conservatory before eloping to the frontier. Her current existence consists of relentless physical labor, including cooking, washing, raising six children, and managing the household. This farm work has taken a severe physical toll on her, suppressing her profound sensitivity to music.

Howard is Georgiana's husband and Clark's uncle, a homesteader in Nebraska originally from rural Vermont. Described by Clark as an idle, shiftless boy in his youth, he pursued Georgiana and brought her to the western frontier. Though he provides for his family and bought his wife a parlor organ, he possesses a hardness and insensitivity that makes him poorly matched to his artistically inclined wife.

Walter is an individual in Nebraska for whom Clark worked as a young boy. While Clark spent his days riding herd for Walter, Georgiana supervised his education during his off hours.