Page:Margaret Sherwood--A Puritan in Bohemia.djvu/26

18 Anne had hung a sketch of her father's face—stern, spiritual, Puritan.

The studio was like Miss Bradford. So were the pictures. Mrs. Kent looked at them again, wondering at the likeness between the artist and her work. There was careful rendering of the wrinkles, the lines about the mouth, the curving of the lips; but the eyes were Anne's own. Into them all had crept that look of mingled thirst for life and fear of life, and they looked out wistfully from the canvases, full of sadness, as if trying to understand.

Mrs. Kent glanced at the artist's clear gray eyes, determined mouth, and smooth, parted hair.

"You must never give up."

"I can't," Anne responded, putting the finishing touches on a thumb. "The work won't give me up. It holds me as a cat does a mouse. You see, it has always been the one thing in the world for me, and life has had no meaning apart from it. I want to be genuine—not like other women. Most women wear their careers