Somehow the conviction she had come to, that fear rather than personal dislike was ruling Elsie’s conduct, comforted her. Moreover, it was a perfect morning—sunshine, a light breeze at the curtains, birds carolling (how had she ever slept through the noise those birds were making?) and the room pervaded by flower scents from balcony and gardens. It was with a light heart, then, that Kate allowed Bertha to run her bath, lay out her clothes, and finally even brush the bobbed hair. Such unneeded service seemed absurd to Kate, but it was in the order of this household, and some fresh sweetness she had brought from sleep made her eager to harmonize herself as much as possible with the world she had come back to. But even so, in a minute when Bertha’s back was turned, Kate grabbed the brush from the dressing table and gave a quick, surreptitious stroke that turned the bang Bertha had created into a wing across her brows; for Bertha, experienced lady’s maid as she was, had not caught the knack of that so quickly.
It was with a heart as bright as the morning that Kate finally went down the long stairs just as the soft-toned gong was sounding. There was no sign of breakfast being laid in the dining-room, so she wandered about the house, in and out of the rooms she had only glimpsed through open doors last night.
Everything was quite beautiful. Kate knew that Aunt Katherine had once been determined to “go in for art seriously.” But at that time money had been lacking for such a design, and she had with keen disappointment submitted to fate and become a school teacher. When wealth had suddenly come to her everyone thought she would, of course, take up study with some great master and become an artist. But this never came about. Perhaps the first disappointment had been too keen; perhaps in giving up her hope so definitely she had made it impossible for herself ever to renew it under any conditions. But now, wandering about these rooms that Aunt Katherine had made, Kate realized that she had turned artist in a way. Instead of painting on canvas she had created beauty in her environment. For her home was like a warmly painted picture with beautiful lights and shadows. And Kate soon felt as though she were walking around in a picture. The morning sunshine outside was its great gilded frame. That was how the utter silence and absence of human beings in these big downstairs rooms explained itself to her fancy; somehow she had walked into a picture painted by her great aunt, a picture hung up somewhere in an enormous gilded frame. This fancy stirred her imagination and she pretended so hard to herself that it became quite real.
That is why she almost started when she finally did hear voices and the clink of china. Coming out of the picture into everyday life, suddenly like that, was something of a jar. And she was probably late for breakfast wherever it was being served. She hurried her steps and found Aunt Katherine and Elsie already at the meal. They were sitting at a little table under a peach tree growing up between the flags of a terrace just outside a sunny breakfast-room. How delightful! Kate was glad now to step down out of the picture.
Aunt Katherine greeted her with a welcoming smile. And having just stepped down out of Aunt Katherine’s picture Kate felt that she understood her, that they were very close to each other really. How different, and how pleasantly different, Great Aunt Katherine was proving herself from Kate’s preconceived ideas of her.
Kate took the little garden chair waiting for her and unfolded her napkin. Coffee was percolating visibly in two large glass globes set one on top of the other before Aunt Katherine. The silver sugar bowl and cream pitcher turned all the sunlight that found them into a million diamond sparkles. A half grapefruit with ice snuggled about it was at Kate’s place. Kate lifted the slender pointed spoon made just for grapefruit, and gratefully tasted the tart pulp and juice.
“Elsie might have shown you the way,” Aunt Katherine was saying. “I thought of course you would come down together.”
“I am sorry I was late. But it was fun wandering around in the house trying to find you.” And then Kate told them all about how she had felt herself in a picture.
Aunt Katherine was pleased. “Was it really like that to you, my house?” she asked.
“Oh, yes! and more so than I know how to say. Most of the windows and doors open, the glimpses of tree branches and flowers and sky, the light and shade in the rooms, all the flowers in vases in surprising places, the colours of everything, the hangings——”