“What didn't I hear?” laughed her lover. “But I didn't do it but once or twice. I lost my head one day and began to argue the question of perspective with a couple of old codgers who were criticizing a bit of foreshortening that was my special pet. I forgot my goggles and sailed in. The game was up then, of course; and I never put them on again. But it was worth a farm to see their faces when I stood 'discovered' as the stage-folk say.”
“Serves you right, sir—listening like that,” scolded Billy.
Bertram laughed and shrugged his shoulders.
“Well, it cured me, anyhow. I haven't done it since,” he declared.
It was some time later, on the way home, that Bertram said:
“It was gratifying, of course, Billy, and I liked it. It would be absurd to say I didn't like the many pleasant words of apparently sincere appreciation I heard to-night. But I couldn't help thinking of the next time—always the next time.”
“The next time?” Billy's eyes were slightly puzzled.
“That I exhibit, I mean. The Bohemian Ten hold their exhibition next month, you know. I shall show just one picture—the portrait of Miss Winthrop.”
“Oh, Bertram!”
“It'll be 'Oh, Bertram!' then, dear, if it isn't a success,” he sighed. “I don't believe you realize yet what that thing is going to mean for me.”