"Oh, the Farleys will take the place," said Brent confidently. "And there is a nice little house on "H" Street that will be vacant about the first of October. I wish you would go in to-morrow and look at it."
"Give me the address," said Caroline. "I have to go in town to-morrow, and I'll take a peep at it. Then, if it seems worth while for you to take the trouble, mamma dear, you can go in next week."
"Only don't let it slip through your fingers," counseled Brent. "Rosa, don't you want to take a little walk up the hill and see the sunset?"
"Get the wheelbarrow!" said Minnie, briskly. "You'll never get Rosa to climb the hill."
But Brent continued to look smilingly at Rosa, and, somewhat to their surprise, she got up and went with him. As they began to climb the gentle slope he took hold of her arm, and she leaned against him with the same unconcern with which she would have accepted aid from one of her sisters. They were gone half an hour, and when they came back a close observer might have noted a satisfied look in Brent's face. He had made a slight, very slight, advance in his plans, whatever they were.
It was in accordance with them that the family moved into the little house on "H" Street within a fortnight. Every afternoon saw Rosa seated before a Corot in the main gallery of the Corcoran Art Building, and for at least two hours she was busily occupied. Just how it came about no one could have said. Perhaps Rosa herself was not aware of the tightening of a leash which had been woven securely about her, and that had guided and now held her to certain duties. Once, as he sat beside her, painting away upon his small canvas with those minute, exquisite touches which characterized his style, Brent said, with some significance:
"You work very well under direction, Rosa; but you wouldn't set a stroke if I were not here, would you?"
She laughed, and turned her eyes upon him inquiringly. "Wouldn't I?" she asked; "ah, well, perhaps not. But then, you see, you are here."
"You have grown so used to having me always at hand, that you couldn't get on at all without me, could you?"