Page:Angna Enters - Among the Daughters.djvu/114

 book of stories she gave me to read when I was home with a cold. Foreigners are interesting, especially about love, though hard to understand. Always saying something not written down.

"Did you ever read a book by a man called—Mapp-assant?" she asked Clem one afternoon during rest period.

"Mean to tell me—you—read Maupassant! Isn't that kind of—strong—for you?"

"Oh, I don't know. It isn't hard to read. I think he's interesting, don't you?" She felt a new respect for Vida. Not only did Vida read the same books as Clem but could draw too, even clearer.

This thought emboldened a critical foray against his latest painting of her. Mystified that he never "finished" a painting or drawing but left a vague indentification [sic] of her appearance, she preferred Vida's drawings. She was considering one afternoon, alone in the studio, "finishing" one of his drawings, a collaboration prevented by Clem's unexpected arrival.

"You don't bother to paint eyelashes?" she hinted.

The implied criticism annoyed him. Why did every model or non-painter have to express an opinion! "It's unnecessary because I suggest them by the general form," he said stiffly, feeling his answer unsatisfactory.

I guess artists just don't see things like people do, Lucy thought, tactfully ending this aesthetic discussion with an "Oh!"

Toward the end of March a brother and sister act was booked into the Orpheum. They were Nebraskans and Congress had legitimate state pride in their growing fame.

This is something Lucy will want to see, thought Semy, going to the studio with a yellow jonquil in his hand, dividend from the florist where he had ordered a funeral wreath on behalf of the Husker-Sun for the funeral of a staff member.

Lucy as usual was exercising at the mantel which she used as a ballet bar.

"A rose by any other name would smell as sweet."

She looked at the flower. A dance costume like it would be beautiful, especially with green tights—but what did it have to do with a rose! Semy liked to say things no one could understand. She wouldn't let on. "It's pretty."

Semy twirled the stem and wished it was her neck. A wasted poetic twist. "I bought it for you because it's the color of your hair." 102