On the wall a clock was ticking; that and the rustling of the fire as the coals sank lower were the only sounds. Like a white satin mantle that had drifted from God’s shoulders, the snow lay across the world. The sun flashed down; the studio was flooded with glory.
About the snow and how it came Jimmie Boy had been inventing stories. It was the angels’ washing day up there and some of their wings had blown off the clothes line. No, wa it wasn’t. This was how the snow really happened. The impatient little children who were waiting to be born had had a pillow-fight, and had burst their pillows.
But his father hadn’t spoken for a long time. The fire was going out. Vashti might arrive at almost any moment And, alas, Teddy was naked. He was posing for the figure of Love, peering in forlornly through the fast-locked gate. He hadn’t wanted to do it; even now he was filled with shame. But Jimmie Boy had offered him money—and he needed money; and Dearie had begged him not to leave Jimmie Boy for a single second. When he had crept up to her room to visit her, she had seized his hands and whispered reproachfully, “Go back to him. Go back.” The best way to be always with his father had been to pose for him.
And there was another reason: by making himself necessary to the picture he had been able to see Vashti. Day after day he had sat in the studio, mouse-quiet, watching her. At night he had made haste to go to sleep that the next day might come more quickly. In the morning, when he had wakened, his first thoughts had been of her; as he dressed, he had told himself, “I shall see her in three hours.” Vashti hadn’t seen her portrait yet; she had been promised that this time she should see it—that this time it should be done. The promise had been made before, but now it was to be kept. So to-day was the last day.
“Please, mayn’t I move?”
“Not yet That’s the sixth time you’ve asked me. I’d have finished if you’d kept quiet.”
“But—but I’m all aches and shivers.”
“Nonsense! You can’t be cold with that great fire.” His father was too absorbed; he hadn’t noticed that the fire had gone out “I know what’s the matter with you, Teddy: you’re afraid she’ll be here before you’re dressed. Pooh! What of it? Now stop just as you are for ten minutes, and then——”
He left his sentence unended and fell to work again with concentrated energy. His mind was aflame with the fury of his imagination. He was far away from reality. It wasn’t Teddy he was painting; it was Love, famished by indifference and tantalized by yearning—Love, bruising his face against the bars which forever shut him out. This wasn’t a London studio, ignobly contrived above a stable; it was a spice-fragrant garden of the East, stared at by the ravishing eye of the sun, where a lady of dreams stooped feeding among tall lilies.
“When am I to see it?” Teddy questioned.
“When she sees it.”
“Not till then?”
“Be still, and don’t ask so many questions.”
“I wanted to see it before her,” explained Teddy, “because I’m hoping I don’t show too much.”
His father wiped a brush on the sleeve of his jacket and wriggled his eyebrows. “Take my word for it, sonny, you look much better as you are now. It’s a shame that we ever have to cover you up.” He laid aside his palette. “There, that’s the last touch. It’s done. By Mohammed, it’s splendid. Jump into your duds, you shrimp. I’m going to tell Dearie before Miss Jodrell comes.”
The wild head vanished through the hole in the floor. Teddy heard his father laughing as he passed through the stable. Creeping to the window, he watched him cut across flower-beds towards the house, kicking up the snow as he ran.
It was done. The great exhilaration was ended. Tomorrow, when he awoke, it would be no good saying, “I shall see her again in three hours.” At night he would gain nothing by going to sleep quickly; the new day when it came would bring him nothing. The studio without her would seem empty and dull. If only he had been fortified by the possession of five pounds, he would have boldly reminded her of her promise. Six-and-sixpence was the sum total of his wealth; it was hidden away in an old cigar box which he had labeled MARRIAGE. If a husband didn’t have at least five pounds, his wife would have to go out charing. He couldn’t imagine Vashti doing that.
Shivering with cold, yet drenched in sunlight he stood hesitating by the window. His body gleamed white and lithe; behind him, tall as manhood, stretched his shadow. Clasping his hands in a silent argument he stepped back and glanced towards the easel. Her face was there, hidden from him behind the canvas. Only his father had seen it yet; but he, too, wanted to see it—he had more right than any one in the world.
He tiptoed a few steps nearer, his bare feet making no sound; halted doubtfully, then stole swiftly forward, lured on by irresistible desire.
He drew back amazed. What had his father done? It was intoxicating. The breath of the lilies drifted out; he could feel their listlessness. An atmosphere of satiety brooded over the garden—a sense of too much sweetness, too much beauty, too much loneliness. The skies, for all their blueness, sagged exhausted. The winds puffed their cheeks in vain, hurrying strength from the north and south. They could not rouse the garden from its contentment. It stifled.
Centermost a woman drooped above the lilies, an enchantress who was herself enchanted. Dreamy with contemplation, she gazed out sideways at the little boy. Her eyes slanted and beckoned, but they failed to read his eyes. Her lips, aloof with indifference, were wistful and scarlet as poppies.
The face was Vashti’s—a striking interpretation; but——
Some latent hint of expression had been over-emphasized. One searched for the difference and found it in the smile that hovered indolently about the edges of her mouth. It wounded and fascinated; it did not satisfy. It seemed to say, “To you I will be everything; to me you shall be nothing.”
Clenching his fists, Teddy stared at her. Tears sprang into his eyes. He was little, but he loved her. She called to him; even while she called, it was as though she shook her head in perpetual denial. Naked in the street outside the garden he saw himself. He was whispering to her, striving to awake her from the trance of the flowers. His face was pressed between the bars and drawn with impatience.
Slowly he bent forward, tiptoeing up, his arms spread back and balanced like wings. His lips touched hers. Hers moved under them. He dashed his fingers across his mouth; they came away blood-colored. He trembled with fear, knowing what he had done.
A rush of footsteps behind him. He was caught in her embrace. It was as though she had leapt out from the picture. She was kneeling beside him, her arms about him, kissing the warm ivory of his body. His sense of shame was overpowered by his sense of wonder.
“The poor little god!” she whispered. “That woman won’t look at him. But when you are Love, Teddy, I open the gate.”
Some one was in the stable; feet were ascending. Shame took the place of wonder at being found naked in her presence.
“Quick. Run behind the curtain and dress,” she muttered.
From his place of hiding he heard his father enter.
“Hulloa! So you got here and saw it without me! Why, what’s this?” And then, “Your lip’s bleeding, Miss Jodrell. Ah, I see now. Vanity! Been kissing yourself; didn’t know the paint was wet. Jove, that’s odd!” He was bending to examine. “The blurring of the lips has altered the expression. There’s something in the face that I never intended.”
“It makes me look kinder, don’t you think?”
James Gurney stood up; he was still intent upon his original conception. “I’ll put that right with half-an-hour’s work.”
“You won’t; it’s my picture. It’s more like me, and I like it better.” She spoke with settled defiance; her voice altered to a tone of taunting slyness. “You’re immensely clever, Mr. Gurney, but you don’t know everything about women.”
She liked it better! Teddy couldn’t confess that his lips had carried the redness from the picture to her mouth. There was a sense of gladness in his guilt. Because of this he believed her irrevocably pledged to him.