"A metaphorical lump, I suppose?"
"Yes, I made patchwork."
"What an extraordinary idea! However, I think I understand it. Your needle represented a brush, and those bits of bright-colored flannels, paint. We must look into that. Now, what else did you study?"
"Mother made me study English grammar. She said she owed it to my father's family to have me understand his language."
"English grammar? How is that?"
"Why, as a general rule, mother talked to me in French, but she was very particular to have me keep up what English I had learned from my father. She had a few French books, and taught me to read to him, and until his death I had plenty of time for it."
"I did not know your father was an Englishman."
"But he was. He was travelling through Europe on foot, stopping to sketch when anything took his fancy, and one day he saw my mother standing near a châlet, with a child in her arms, and fell in love with her. The child belonged to a neighbor who often lodged artists for weeks at a time, and he contrived to spend a whole summer there."
But our readers need not hear the whole story of Margaret's fragmentary education. She was now between seventeen and eighteen, and had managed to pick up a wonderful amount of information; but culture she had none. This she soon began to feel, but as the companion of a woman cultivated to the last degree, and with her own brilliant powers, she glided, without difficulty, into regions most girls in her position would have had to reach through laborious toil. And as to art, Mrs. Grey had only to provide her with materials, and give her opportunity to experiment, and the next thing she knew, grace and beauty dropped like magic from the tiny point of her pencil. But so many other gifts developed themselves, that there was no danger of one-sidedness.
So she dashed on, eager, breathless, like one running a race; entering into everything with zest and enjoyment, and undertaking work enough to exhaust a less dauntless nature. And then another cloud began to arise. Christmas was coming, and with it twelve human beings to criticise, misunderstand, dislike her.