Why is ～とみえる used here?


I'm reading a short story called 『つめたいよるに』. This girl was crying on the train
to work, so another passenger (the 少年 below) invited her for a coffee.

> 公衆電話からアルバイト先に電話をして、風邪をひいたので休ませていただきます、と言ったのを聞いていた **とみえて**
> 、私がテーブルにもどると、「じゃあ、きょうは一日ひまなんだ」 少年はぶっきらぼうに言った。

I've not encountered ～とみえる before, but even after looking up the meaning
(another variant of "seems, looks like", I think), I'm still not sure what
meaning it brings to this sentence.

Is ～とみえる related to ～に見える?




Yes, this 終止形+とみえる (or と見える) is another variant of ように見える ("it seems", "it
looks like"). It's a literary expression, so we don't usually use it in
conversations.

～と言ったのを聞いていたとみえる is "It seems he (=少年) heard I had said ～", where "～" here is
"風邪を引いたので休ませていただきます". He said "きょうは一日ひまなんだ", because he was listening to the
phone call (of "I") and knew "I" was going to take the day off that day.




Yes, this 終止形+とみえる (or と見える) is another variant of ように見える ("it seems", "it
looks like"). It's a literary expression, so we don't usually use it in
conversations.

～と言ったのを聞いていたとみえる is "It seems he (=少年) heard I had said ～", where "～" here is
"風邪を引いたので休ませていただきます". He said "きょうは一日ひまなんだ", because he was listening to the
phone call (of "I") and knew "I" was going to take the day off that day.

