“No, no. What is a guinea between artists?” And he pressed the parcel into Matt’s hand.
Matt shook his head. He was appalled at the price, but he felt it wouldn’t be fair to take the poor old man’s work for nothing. A vague suspicion that he was being tricked flitted beneath his troubled mind, but his worldly experiences had not yet robbed him of his guilelessness, and there was such a fire of abnegation in the homely face that Matt felt ashamed of his doubt, and drew out the money with a feeling that he was, at any rate, helping a worthy artistic soul.
“Here is the price of them,” he said.
The artist took the money and looked at it.
“A guinea would give me nearly another month’s lessons,” he said, wistfully.
“Put it in your pocket, then,” insisted Matt, his last doubt dissolving in fellow-feeling.
But the cobbler shook his head. “No, no, sir, you mustn’t rob me of my impulse. I cannot charge you full price. Take back the shilling. Concede something to my feelings.”
“There—if that ’ll satisfy you,” said Matt, reaccepting it.
“You won’t tell the chaps,” besought the shoemaker, pathetically. “They wouldn’t understand us. They would laugh at our innocent enthusiasm.”
As Matt shared this distrust of the sympathy of the studio, he was not backward with assurances of secrecy, while he was laboriously bulking his overcoat-pocket with the parcel.