He saw her eyes fill. “Oh, but it won’t be! There are so many ways still in which I can economize.”
He laid his hand on hers and turned his profile toward her, because he knew it was so much stronger than his full face. He did not feel sure that she quite grasped his intention about the pictures; was not even certain that he wished her to. He went in to New York every week now, occupying himself mysteriously and importantly with plans, specifications and other business transactions with long names; while Treeshy, through the hot summer months, sat in Tarrytown and waited for the baby.
A little girl was born at the end of the summer and christened Louisa; and when she was a few weeks old the Lewis Raycies left the country for New York.
“Now!” thought Lewis, as they bumped over the cobblestones of Tenth Street in the direction of Cousin Ebenezer’s house.
The carriage stopped, he handed out his wife, the nurse followed with the baby, and they all stood and looked up at the house-front.
“Oh, Lewis—” Treeshy gasped; and even little Louisa set up a sympathetic wail.
Over the door—over Cousin Ebenezer’s respectable, conservative and intensely private front-door—hung a large sign-board bearing, in gold letters on a black ground, the inscription:
GALLERY OF CHRISTIAN ART
Open on Week-Days from 2 to 4
Admission 25 Cents. Children 10 Cents.
Lewis saw his wife turn pale, and pressed her arm in his. “Believe me, it’s the only way to make the pictures known. And they must be made known,” he said with a thrill of his old ardour.
“Yes, dear, of course. But ... to every one? Publicly?”