"Wilmur Benton painted them."
"Yes, both," he replied. "Are they not beautiful?"
"Mine is not, I am sure, Louis; but your mother's,—oh, how lovely it is, and as natural as life! It must be the one to which Mary referred."
"It is, my Emily. I secured it long ago, and Mr. Benton has been a long time at work on yours. He is sadly afflicted, and does not look like the same man. His wife is dead, and I think he will not himself stay long. I have been to see him always when in Boston, and would have told you all before, had I not feared you might, by getting hold of one thread, find another; Hal knows all about it. But see, Emily, just see yourself as you are. I told you your eyes should speak from the canvas, and is it not as well as if my own hand had held the brush?"
I looked the words I could not say, and wondered how it came that this likeness should have been painted without my being before the artist. It was years since Wilmur Benton left us, and the picture represented me at my present age, I thought, and I asked:
"How did he get the expression, Louis?"
"Oh, Emily, he remembered every outline of your face, and with the greatest ease defined them! Then from time to time, I sat near and suggested here or there a change, until at last the work was perfected, which in all its beauty only tells the truth; you do not see yourself when your face lights up with glorious thought; the depth of your eyes was to me always a study, and this man, Emily, carries in his heart to-day the knowledge of your worth; he holds you and my little mother in fond remembrance. His soul is purified by suffering, and this last visit I made him has given him strength to tell me his whole life. When with a sigh he ended his story, he looked at me sorrowfully, and said:
"'I suppose you will despise me now, but I feel that after all your kindness I must tell you, for it is right you should know. Halbert, I have never told—it is as well not to do so.'"
"Poor fellow," I said, "and we knew it all before."
"No, not all; his life has been a drama with wonderfully wild, sad scenes, and the great waves of his troubles and errors have, at times, driven him nearly crazy. His eldest son is an artist like himself, and finely organized. The other is in the West with an uncle of his mother's. Are you sorry I have done all this? Speak, my beloved."