Page:The Better Sort (New York, Charles Scribners Sons, 1903).djvu/126

THE BETTER SORT. I had whisked out of sight for a month the picture I had produced for Mrs. Cavenham, and it was now completely covered with a large piece of stuff. I stood there a little, thinking of it, and she went on as if she feared I might be unwilling. "Can't you do it?"

It showed me that she had not heard from him of my having painted him, and this, further, was an indication that, his purpose effected, he had ceased to see her. "I suppose you know," I presently said, "what you've done for him?"

"Oh yes; it was what I wanted."

"It was what he wanted!" I laughed.

"Well, I want what he wants."

"Even to his marrying Mrs. Cavenham?"

She hesitated. "As well her as anyone, from the moment he couldn't marry me."

"It was beautiful of you to be so sure of that," I returned.

"How could I be anything else but sure? He doesn't so much as know me!" said Alice Dundene.

"No," I declared, "I verily believe he doesn't. There's your picture," I added, unveiling my work.

She was amazed and delighted. "I may have that?"

"So far as I'm concerned—absolutely."

"Then he had himself the beautiful thought of sitting for me?"

I faltered but an instant. "Yes."

Her pleasure in what I had done was a joy to me. "Why, it's of a truth! It's perfection."

"I think it is."

"It's the whole story. It's life."

"That's what I tried for," I said; and I added to myself: "Why the deuce do we?"

"It will be him for me," she meanwhile went on. "I shall live with it, keep it all to myself, and—do you know what it will do?—it will seem to make up." 114