“How lovely! This would make such a pretty picture, if one might put it on canvas. This great hall, with the curious staircase, the old-time furniture, and that big, hospitable vista beyond! May I sketch it sometime, Miss Joanna?”
“Yes, indeed! And we would feel honored. Ah! those old outside galleries,—galleries we called them, when I was young,—many’s the cotillon has been danced upon them, many the tea-party gathered there. See this table! It is a century and a half old. It is only about four feet in diameter, yet eighteen people have gathered about that bit of mahogany to drink a cup of tea, when tea was tea, my dear! These are the cups; they were my grandmother’s. See?”
The old lady stepped to a cabinet and took out a tiny cup and saucer of delicate china, thin as an egg-shell and no larger than the smaller end of one. “I often sit and muse over those old times. I can imagine the whole scene so well, and sometimes I almost find myself talking gossip with the dead-and-gone dames who drank to the success of ‘the army’ in these same bits of cups. I must show you my grandmother’s gowns and things some day, my dear; I think you would enjoy seeing them, even trying them on, if you like. Eh?”
A moment’s thought flashed through Isabelle’s brain. Here were artistic possibilities open to her that the city could not have furnished, and her discontent vanished entirely. “I should be very grateful, dear Miss Brook! It would be a treasure-trove to me! But sometime, after I have worked very, very faithfully to do better things than I ever have accomplished, will you sit to me for a sketch? It sounds like the greatest presumption, yet would you?”
“Would I? Would I not? I should be delighted! Make a trial right away, to-morrow if you can. I should love to give a new picture of myself to Chidly. The last one I had painted was when I was middle-aged, in ‘my prime’ some flatterers said, ‘neither hay nor grass,’ I said. I had outgrown the dimples of youth and I had not acquired the finish of age. I’m in my prime now, I fancy, as near as I ever shall be until God sends Azrael to lay the touch of perfect peace upon my restless lips.”
“There was no answer, and Miss Joanna turned
about swiftly.”
She led the way without another word into the wide eastern drawing-room, and threw open the shutters to let in the morning sunshine.
“Here you are, my child, free to do exactly as you please. Make the rooms as pretty as you can, and I begin with this first, because it is chief. You can call for one of the men to cut as many flowers as you like. The bushes and trees are loaded with blossoms now. And, oh! here is something you will like, at least I hope so. A gift from the daughter of a dear old friend, herself as noble a woman as ever drew breath though she couldn’t help be that, with such a mother! The girl—dear me! she’s fifty, if a day, but a girl to me always!—this girl is manager of one of the art rooms in the city, and she brought me this for a birthday gift from there. Isn’t it pretty?”
There was no answer, and Miss Joanna turned about swiftly. She was a woman who liked others to share her enthusiasms.