It was very pleasant under the subdued lights from above. She followed the sweep of the drapery with delighted eye, taking an almost sensuous pleasure in the relation of color and the grace of the arms and throat—the simplicity of the modeling and the admirable characterization.
She found herself repeating:
“‘And those that were good shall be happy,
They shall sit in a golden chair;
They shall splash at a ten-league canvas
With brushes of comet’s hair.’
“Philip Burnett, I wonder if you’re good? You ought to be. I’d be good if I could paint like that. I’d work for an age at a sitting, too. How could one ever be tired making adagios in color? Oh!” she sighed, “how good it must be to amount to something!”
A procession of agreeable, vacuous faces passed before the canvas, creatures of a common fate, garbed in the uniform of convention, carrying the polite weapons of Vanity Fair, each like the others and as uninteresting. The few who wore the bright chevrons of distinction had marched with the throng for a time, but had gone back to their own. She wondered if it would really matter if she never saw them again; of course, the women—but the men. Would she care?
Was there not another life? It beckoned to her. What was Philip Burnett like? Could he be young and handsome as well as gifted? The vacuous faces vanished and in their place she could see this young genius—Antinous and Hercules combined—standing before this canvas living for the mere joy of work. Here was her answer. Was she to flit through enchanted gardens other people had planted, sipping only at the perfumed petals while the honey to be garnered was in plain sight?
A voice broke in just beside her:
“It’s convincing, but I tell you, Burnett, the arm’s too long.”