"I have two big pieces of news for you," Mrs. Fenton said, when the soup had been removed. "I have been to call on Mrs. Stewart Hubbard this afternoon, and Mr. Hubbard is going to have you paint him. Isn't that good?"
Her husband looked up in evident pleasure.
"That isn't so bad," was his reply. "He'll make a stunning picture, and the Hubbards are precisely the sort of people one likes to have dealings with. Is he going at it soon?"
"He is coming to see you to-morrow, Mrs. Hubbard said. The picture is to be her birthday present. I told her you were so busy I didn't know when you could begin."
"I would stretch a point to please Mr. Hubbard. I am almost done with Irons, vulgar old cad. I wish I dared paint him as bad as he really looks."
"But your artistic conscience won't let you?" she queried, smiling. "He is a dreadful old creature; but he means well."
"People who mean well are always worse than those who don't mean anything; but I can make it up with Hubbard. He looks like Rubens' St. Simeon. I wish he wore the same sort of clothes."
"You might persuade him to, for the picture. But my second piece of news is almost as good. Helen is coming home."
"Helen Greyson?"
"Helen Greyson. I had a letter from her today, written in Paris. She had already got so far, and she ought to be here very soon."