"Why on earth didn't you get some one to lie on the floor as a model?"
Mona's face assumed an expression of horror.
"You don't suppose I spoke to any one of my picture! I was worlds too shy. Is that all you know of the diffidence of genius?"
"I expect it was a very clever picture," said Lady Munro admiringly.
"My dear aunt, I can see it clearly in my mind's eye now, and although 'the past will always win a glory from its being far,' I cannot flatter myself that there is an atom of talent in that picture. There is not a strong line in it. I had plenty of resource, but no facility."
"It must have been a great disappointment to you to leave it unfinished at last."
"Oh dear, no! I believe the difficulty of the legs would have been surmounted in the long-run somehow, but I suddenly discovered that the true secret of happiness lay in novel-writing. I spent the one penny I possessed at the moment on a note-book, and set to work."
"What was the title?" asked Evelyn, who had some thoughts of writing a novel herself.
"'Jack's First Sixpence,'" said Mona solemnly.
"And the plot——?" asked Sir Douglas.