Her coming and going made a mental movement, for there had been no sound. Brooke raised her head, and looking about in a dazed way spied the note, which said, “As everybody and thing seems to be asleep, have gone home to dine with father; will be back before ten.”
It was a positive relief to Brooke to be quite alone for a few hours, and it would also give her the chance to see the physicians more satisfactorily; they were due about six.
Going to her own room, she found her mother had returned to the sick room, so, slipping on a wrapper and loosening the tension of hair-pains, she busied herself by laying away in closet and dresser various things that had lain about since two nights before, which Olga, the maid, under stress of confusion, had neglected. Taking up her great chinchilla muff from a chair, she was shaking it in an absent-minded fashion before putting it in its box, when something slipped from it and fell lightly to the carpet. Groping in the dim light, she picked up, not her card case, as she expected, but the silk-covered catalogue of the Parkses’ pictures and the souvenir menu in its frame of silver filigree. It was only two days since she had put them in her muff, but it seemed almost as if she were looking back from another world.
The catalogue naturally opened to the little reproduction of Marte Lorenz’ picture. Cutting it carefully from the page, she slipped it into the silver frame, which chanced to be of the exact size, and setting it upon the dressing table, turned on the light above. Somehow the sight of it gave her comfort more than anything else could, and the separation of circumstances and distance seemed suddenly to have grown less. Whatever the interpretation of the picture might be, whatever else might tide, she had entered into and formed a part of the artist’s first serious work, and even if they never met again, they would be comrades upon the canvas as long as it lasted. For, in spite of the veiling of both the likenesses by certain subtle touches, it did not obliterate the characteristics of the two; and the longer that Brooke gazed upon the picture the stronger grew her conviction that, under guise of an attractive composition, it was he and she that Lorenz had painted, that he had bound together forever by some mystical inspiration.
Still Brooke did not formulate her feelings toward this man who had been the first one to tell her the truth when an untruth or evasion would have had a pleasanter sound; such a thing did not occur to her. Lucy Dean would have dragged her emotion into the electric light, diagnosed, and duly labelled it at once. Neither did Brooke kiss the portrait nor put it under her pillow, nor hide it away in her orris-scented drawer for sentiment’s sake or to feed mystery, as many a girl would have done; but as the light glared upon the glass she turned it out, and lighting a small green candle of bayberry wax, that stood upon her desk, placed it near the frame so that its rays fell obliquely in accord with the picture’s scheme of light, while the pungent fragrance of the wax wafted like incense at a shrine.
As she stood thus, the outer door closed, a squeaky tread awkwardly muffled came along the hallway, and stopping outside her door made her turn hastily. Without further ado the door opened, and a pair of lean, sloping shoulders and a freckled face topped by a mop of sandy hair parted the curtain, while two dull, greenish hazel eyes, very round and wide open, explored the room to the very corners with an expression of apprehension. Evidently being satisfied with the result, the rest of the six feet of overgrown boy followed the head, swinging a suit case before him with one hand, while he closed the door behind him with the other.
Brooke was almost startled into calling out aloud, but the figure clapped his hand to her mouth, and her voice dropped to a whispered “Oh, Cub, Cub, where did you come from? How did you hear?”
“Why, from school, to be sure, Sis, and I heard from Mummy, else I hadn’t dared, or couldn’t have come,—she sent me a ten,—for I spent all that was left of my quarterly on Pam; she was worth it, even if I’d have had to walk. I’ve only had her a month, but she knows my whistle out of twenty, and she just loves me; yes, she does, you ought to see her look at me with her head on one side. I’ve just left her below with the engineer till I saw if the coast was clear. I’ll bring her up to you, unless you think father’s likely to come in. Then I suppose I’ll have to take her to the stable for keeps.”
While the boy rattled on, Brooke was recalling the fact of her brother’s letter, and that her mother had told her about sending for him to come home in spite of everything. He had come, then, in response to that and knew nothing of what had happened.