Uncle William/Chapter 12

AN I see her to-day?” It was the first question in the morning.

“You better?”

“Yes.”

“You feelin’ well enough to sit up?”

“Yes.”

“Well, then, you can stay where you be another day.” Uncle William smiled cheerfully.

“Can I see her?”

“We ’ll see about that. I ’ve got a good many things to tend to.” Uncle William bustled away.

After a time his head was thrust in the door. “I ’ll go see her, myself, byme-by,” he said kindly. “Mebbe she ’ll come back with me.”

“It ’s too late now.” The artist spoke a little bitterly.

“Too late!” Uncle William came out, reproachful and surprised. “What d’ you mean?”

“It ’s quarter to nine. She goes to work at nine. She has pupils—she teaches all day.”

Uncle William’s face dropped a little. “That ’s too bad now, ain’t it! But don’t you mind. I wa’n’t just certain I ’d let you see her to-day, anyhow.”

“When can I?”

Uncle William pondered. “You ’re in a good deal of a hurry, ain’t you?”

“I want to tell her—”

“Yes, yes, I know.—Well,—’bout to-morrow. How ’d that do?”

“You could send her a note,” said the artist.

“I ’m goin’ to see her,” said Uncle William. “She ’ll be to home this evenin’, won’t she?”

“Yes.”

“I ’ll go see her.”

The artist looked doubtful.

“Can’t I got see her?” said Uncle William.

“I was wondering whether you could find the way.”

“H’m-m. Where ’d you say it was?”

“Eighteenth Street, near Broadway.”

“Eighteenth? That ’s somewheres between Seventeenth and Nineteenth, ain’t it?” said Uncle William, dryly.

“Yes.” The artist smiled faintly.

Uncle William nodded. “I thought so. And I don’t s’pose they ’ve changed the lay of Broadway a gre’ deal?”

“No—not much.”

“Well, I reckon I can find it. I gen’ally do; and I can’t get far out o’ the way with this.” He touched the compass that hung from the fob of the great watch. “I ’ve been putty much all over the world with that. I reckon it ’ll p’int about the same in New York as it does in Arichat. Now, I ’ve got your breakfast ’most ready, but I can’t seem to remember about your coffee.—You take sugar and milk in it, don’t you?”

“Yes.” The tone was almost sulky.

Uncle William looked at him shrewdly over his spectacles. “I don’t believe you feel well enough to see anybody for a good while, do you?”

The artist’s face changed subtly—like a child’s. It was almost cheerful.

Uncle William laughed out. “That ’s better—a little mite better. I guess ’bout day after to-morrow you ’ll do to see company.”

The young man stretched out a hand. “I must see her. I shall get up—”

“There, there. I would n’t try to get up if I was you,” said Uncle William, genially. “I ’ve put away your clothes, different places. I don’t jest know where they be, myself. It ’ll be quite a chore to get ’em all together. You jest lie still, and let me manage.”

The young man ate his breakfast with relish. A subtle resolve to get up and do things was in his eye.

Uncle William watched it, chuckling. “Sha’n’t be able to keep him there more ’n a day longer,” he said. “Better feed him well whilst I can.” He prepared clam-broth and toast, and wondered about an omelet, rolling in and out of the room with comfortable gait.

The artist ate everything that was set before him, eagerly. The resolve in his eye yielded to appreciation. “You ought to have been a chef, Uncle William. I never tasted anything better than that.” He was eating a last bit of toast, searching with his fork for stray crumbs.

Uncle William nodded. “The’ ’s a good many things I’d o’t to ’a’ been if I ’d had time. That ’s the trouble with livin’. You don’t hev time. You jest practise a day or two on suthin’—get kind o’ ust to it—and then you up and hev to do suthin’ else. I like cookin’ fust rate while I ’m doin’ it.... I dunno as I should like it reg’lar, though. It ’d be kind o’ fiddlin’ work, gettin’ up and makin’ omelets every mornin’.”

“You ’re an artist,” said the young man.

“Mebbe. Don’t you think you ’ve licked that plate about clean?” Uncle William looked at it approvingly. “It ain’t much work to wash dishes for you.”

At intervals during the day the artist demanded his clothes, each time a little more vigorously. Uncle William put him off. “I don’t see that picter of my house anywheres ’round,” he said when pressed too close.

“No.”

“You sent it off?”

“Yes.” The young man was silent a minute. “Sergia took them—all of them—when I fell sick. They were not ready—not even framed. She was to send them to the committee. I have not heard.”

“I ’ll go see ’em in the mornin’,” said Uncle William.

“I don’t know that you can—”

“Can’t anybody go in—if it ’s an exhibit—by payin’ suthin’?”

“I mean, I don’t know that they ’re hung.”

“Well, I would n’t bother about that. I ’d like to see ’em jest as well if they ain’t hung. I ’m putty tall, but I can scooch down as well as anybody. It ’ll seem kind o’ good to see the old place. I was thinkin’ this mornin’ I wish’t there was two-three rocks round somewheres. I guess that ’s what picters are for. Some folks hev to live in New York—can’t get away. I sha’n’t mind if they ain’t hung up. I can see ’em all right, scoochin’ a little.”

The young man smiled. “I don’t know that they ’re accepted.”

“Why not—if she sent ’em?”

“Oh, she sent them all right. They may have been refused.”

“At an exhibit?”

“Yes.”

“Well, up our way we don’t do like that. We take everything that comes in—pies and pickles and bedquilts and pumpkins and everything; putty triflin’ stuff, some of it, but they take it.—This is different, I s’pose?”

“A little. Yes. They only take the best—or what they call the best.” The tone was bitter.

Uncle William looked at him mildly. “Then they took yourn—every one on ’em. They was as good picters as I ever see.”

The artist’s face lightened a little. “They were good.” His thought dwelt on them lovingly.

Uncle William slipped quietly away to his room. The artist heard him moving about, opening and shutting bureau drawers, humming gently and fussing and talking in broken bits. Time passed. It was growing dark in the room.

The artist turned a little impatiently. “Hallo there!”

Uncle William stuck out his head. “Want suthin’?”

“What are you doing?” said the artist. It was almost querulous.

Uncle William came out, smoothing his neckerchief. It was a new one, blue like the sky. “I was fixin’ up a little to go see her. Do I look to suit you?” He moved nearer in the dusk with a kind of high pride. The tufts of hair stood erect on his round head, the neckerchief had a breezy knot with fluttering ends, and the coat hung from his great shoulders like a sail afloat.

The artist looked him over admiringly. “You ’re great!” he said. “How did you come to know enough not to change?”

“I ’ve changed everything!” declared Uncle William. His air of pride drooped a little.

The artist laughed out. “I mean you kept your same kind of clothes. A good many people, when they come down here to New York, try to dress like other folks—get new things.”

Uncle William’s face cleared. He looked down his great bulk with a smile. “I like my own things,” he said. “I feel to home in ’em.”