While they were talking, a knock was heard at the door, and as all rules were relaxed at this hour, both women called out, “Entrez!”
The door was opened, and around the corner of the old sail-cloth screen the tall figure of Harold appeared. The day was raw and chilly, and he wore a fur-lined coat with its large fur collar drawn close around his throat, and carried his high hat and his stick in his hand.
At sight of him Martha uttered a little exclamation of pleasure, and gaily called to him to come on. Sonia, in spite of the jerk at her heart-strings and the rush of blood through all her veins, felt, taken unprepared as she was, a sudden sense of strength and self-possession. Her color deepened, and by a swift motion she drew herself erect; and as she stood there in her old green skirt and red silk blouse, she looked so workman-like and charming that, as Martha drew her brother forward toward their easels, her heart quite glowed with pride in both her dear companions. She always adored Harold in that coat, and Sonia in that dress, and her sensitive organism seemed to be receiving impressions of pleasure from the minds of each. Harold stood still, a little distance off, and bowed, with a look that expressed some hesitation or uncertainty. Looking past his sister and at her friend, he said:
“Do you permit me to look at your work?”
“Oh, if you care to,” said Sonia in a light and natural tone. “It’s a mere daub of a study. One goes through a great deal of discouragement in a place like this, and a great deal of one’s time is spent in acquiring a knowledge of one’s ignorance. After that is quite mastered, things get easier. I think I may say that I have graduated in that branch of study, and am now ready to go on to the more advanced ones.”
Harold stood still, and looked at her picture. She was thinking how natural it would be to ask him if he thought she had improved. He was thinking how natural it would be to tell her that she had. Martha was thinking how beautiful and full of charm they both were, and almost wishing that the atelier could be filled with students to look at such models.
It occurred to her now that Harold remained silent unnecessarily long, and she was afraid that he did not appreciate her friend’s work; so she herself began to speak in voluble praise of it.
Sonia felt a strong impulse to check her, and to explain to her that he was always silent when he really liked a thing exceedingly, and that she therefore felt delighted that he said nothing.
Harold, however, forced himself to utter a few words of praise that sounded very stiff and conventional, and a sort of bewildered look, which Martha could not understand, came into his eyes. Sonia understood it by its reflection in her own heart. She felt as if she were in some strange, confusing dream, where the conditions around her were sad and constrained, and yet which she felt she must hold on to and keep conscious of, lest they should vanish and leave her utterly empty-hearted, estranged, and desolate. While Martha exhibited her own work, and proceeded to pick it to pieces in imitation of what Etienne would say to-morrow, the man and woman standing behind her, so near that they almost touched, were feeling, from this proximity, a force that went to the very deeps of both their natures. Hardness, resentment, wounded pride, regret—all these were parts of this force in each; but there was in it, too, something stronger than any of them, something that warned Sonia that she had better not trust herself, at the same moment that Harold turned abruptly away, and said that he had an engagement, and could not wait longer. He explained in a hurried, confused speech, out of which it was hard to get any intelligent meaning, that he had forgotten Martha’s need of the carriage, and had kept it waiting somewhere for him, which was his excuse for coming to the atelier to see if she had waited or was gone.
Martha saw by his manner that something was wrong, and made haste to put up her brushes, and follow him into the cloak-room, insisting that Sonia should come also, as she objected to leaving her there alone.