“Somebody was needed to keep it in order,” Mrs. Moffat put in. They were all sitting around the table after dinner that evening.
“Eloise and Janet and I kept house,” Peg put in significantly. “And, really, talk about temperament! We had no regular meals at all, and Eloise says if you show her crackers and pimento cheese again for a year, she’ll simply die in her tracks. Mom has fed us up beautifully since she came back from Miami. Real substantial food.”
“Yes and they didn’t think they needed me at all, Jean. Somehow a mother doesn’t go with studio equipment, but this one does, and now everyone in the block comes down to visit us. They all need mothering now.”
Jean found the studio delightfully attractive. The ceiling was beamed in dark oak, and a wide fireplace with a crackling wood fire made Jean almost feel as if she were back home. There were wide shelves lined with books on painting all around the room. At the windows hung shrimp-colored draperies that could be pulled across on transverse rods to shut out the night. A small spinet piano took up one corner of the room and now Peg walked over to it and sat down to play. In the middle of a Mozart sonata, Jean sighed heavily.
Peg stopped playing, turned around, and asked, “What is it? Tired?”
Jean’s lashes were wet with unshed tears.
“I was wishing Mother were here too,” she answered. “She loves all this so—just as I do. It’s awfully lonesome up there sometimes without any of this. I love the hills and the freedom, but, oh, it is so lonely. Why, I even love to hear the horns of the cabs blowing impatiently and the sound of the busses releasing their air brakes.”
Jean slept late the next morning, late for her at least. It was nearly ten when Mrs. Moffat came into the large room to pull back the curtains and say that breakfast was nearly ready.
“Did you close the big house at the Cove?” Jean asked while they were dressing.
“Rented it furnished. With Brock away at college and me sharing this studio with Eloise and Janet, Mother thought she’d let it go, and stay with me when she came back from Florida. She’s over at Aunt Win’s while I’m at classes. They’ve got an apartment overlooking Central Park because Uncle Frank can’t bear commuting in the winter. We’ll go over there tomorrow afternoon. Aunt Win’s up to her eyebrows in hospital work.”