Poor Mrs. Blundell evidently held strong views on the deficiencies of her residence, to judge from a conversation which Miss Aubrey and Katrine heard wafted through the door as they sat sketching in her cabbage-patch. The minister appeared to be paying her a visit, and was trying to count up her blessings for her—a form of consolation which, from her tart replies, she keenly resented.
"You've got a roof over your head," he urged.
"The rain comes through in the corner," she sniffed. "It don't be right as I should be in this place, and some in such comfort! Folks as live soft here didn't ought to go to Heaven!"
"But wealthy people can live good lives as well as poor ones," objected Mr. Chadwick, the minister.
"Easy enough for 'em, when they've all they want; but it don't be fair! They be gettin' it at both ends," she answered bitterly.
"Doth Job serve God for nought?" quoted Miss Aubrey, as they listened to the querulous old voice. "I quite grasp her point, poor old soul! I dare say it's much easier to watch the wicked flourishing like a green bay tree, and anticipate his retribution, than to see the righteous in such prosperity, and think he's skimming the cream off both worlds. I admire Mr. Chadwick's patience. I think he'll talk her into a better frame of mind before he leaves her."
Whatever her notions might be on the subject of future rewards or punishments, Granny Blundell made a picturesque model, and that for the present was Katrine's main concern. She finished both figures and background, then left the canvas to dry, so that she might add some last high lights. Would it ever hang in an exhibition? she asked herself. She had not yet dared to broach the subject to Mr. Freeman.
She looked at it often, hopefully and wistfully. At present it was the focus round which her dreams centred, a matter of the utmost importance. The rest of the girls would have laughed at her had they realized her ambition in connection with it; yet, after all—so strangely do things happen in this life—the painting of this very amateur sketch was a link in a chain of circumstances, and if it did not bring artistic success to herself, was to lead to wider issues in other respects than she could imagine.