So there in the tea shop, cool and quiet and growing a bit dim as the sun sank behind the towers and tiles of Siena, Cynthia hauled out her sketches. There were some of the crowd she had made just this afternoon, of the carabinari, heads gravely bent, two by two, always two by two, white gloved hands folded behind their solemn backs.
“You have quite a knack for caricature,” commented Mr. Lewis, and Cynthia said, “You have to, if you are going to do portraits. A really good likeness always holds a little exaggeration.”
At which he nodded understandingly. Nice to be showing your sketches to another artist.
“And here are some of the landscapes I’ve done around Siena, mostly bits of streets and old tiled houses. They aren’t as good as my people.”
“And here is your madonna,” she cried, hauling out the drawing she had finished the day before. She told him about her plan to have an exhibition of the heads and of the landscapes together.
“That’s a good idea too,” he agreed, and propped the little sketch of the monastery against a chair and sat back to squint at it.
“I wonder,” he said at last, “if you’d be willing to make a sale before you go home. I have a fancy to own this one,” and he nodded towards the little tiled gateway. “Could you part with it, do you think?”
Cynthia hesitated. She did sort of want to show that one to Chick and hear his approval. But perhaps tomorrow she could go back to the same place and make another, even a better one.
“We..ll, yes,” she agreed reluctantly. “I might.”
And then came the “How much?” which she had dreaded. Cynthia knew the value, at least the commercial value, of her portraits. But the landscapes were different. They were just studies, perhaps not worth anything at all. “Would ... would two dollars be too much?” she asked. “Or maybe three?”