"I've never been in a studio before," said Betty, fixing fresh paper.
"My!" said the girl again. "Turn the faucet off now. The model don't like us to whisper. Can't stand the draught."
So Betty was silent, working busily. But next day she was greeted with friendly nods and she had some one to speak to in the rest-intervals.
On the third day she was asked to a studio party by the girl who had fanned her on the stairs. "And bring your friend with you," she said.
But Betty's friend had a headache that day. Betty went alone and came home full of the party.
"She's got such a jolly studio," she said; "ever so high up,—and busts and casts and things. Everyone was so nice to me you can't think: it was just like what one hears of Girton Cocoa parties. We had tea—such weak tea, Paula, it could hardly crawl out of the teapot! We had it out of green basins. And the loveliest cakes! There were only two chairs, so some of us sat on the sommier and the rest on the floor."
"Were there any young men?" asked Paula.
"Two or three very, very young ones—they came late. But they might as well have been girls; there wasn't any flirting or nonsense of that sort, Paula. Don't you think we might give a party—not now, but presently, when we know some more people? Do you think they'd like it? Or would they think it a bore?"
"They'd love it, I should think." Paula looked round the room which already she loved. "And what did you all talk about?"
"Work," said Betty, "work and work and work and work and work: everyone talked about their work, and everyone else listened and watched for the chance to begin to talk about theirs. This is real life, my dear. I am so glad I'm beginning to know people. Miss Voscoe is very queer, but she's a dear. She's the one who caricatured me the first day. Oh, we shall do now, shan't we?"