Flint: His Faults, His Friendships and His Fortunes

by Maud Wilder Goodwin

"What—who is it?" Winifred asked, turning from one to another of us with bewilderment in her eyes.

"A relative of yours, I believe," Mr. Flint answered quietly. "Her name is Ruth. She formed the habit of eloping in her youth, and had not the heart to refuse my entreaties to run away with me when I left Nepaug."

Then in an instant it flashed across Winifred and all of us that this was the portrait for which she had been searching all summer (any one might have recognized it, for the resemblance to Winifred about the eyes and mouth is unmistakable), and she knew of course that Mr. Flint had been the one to find it. Her way of taking the affair was very characteristic. There was no tearful tremulous gratitude like Nora Costello's, but a great overflow of pride and gladness. Rising, with her just filled wine glass in her hand, and her head thrown back a little as if in a pride which had a shade of defiance in it, she called out, "A health!—a health! Here's to my great-great-grandmother, the runaway bride, and to the generous man who restored her to the bosom of her family!"

Every one looked bewildered, but all laughed and drank the toast (I noticed that the Costellos [Pg 250] drank theirs in water), and then began to ask questions as fast as they could talk. The health broke up the feast, and every one crowded about the portrait. As Winifred and Mr. Flint stood close behind me, I overheard, this time without intention, upon my honor, an exchange of remarks between them.

"You have shown yourself very generous, Mr. Flint," Winifred remarked. "You will not surely be so ungenerous as not to let us make some little return for your gift. I am not ignorant that such a portrait has a value besides that of sentiment."

"You touch me there on a sore point, Miss Anstice," Mr. Flint answered. "I am afraid the person to whom you are really indebted is old Marsden, for I knew if I offered him anything like the real value of the picture, he would hold it for the price of a Raphael. So I made him set his own price, which the sly old dog thought a staggering one, and which I found so absurdly low that I shall feel bound to remember him handsomely at Christmas."

"You are jesting," Winifred answered, speaking lower; "but I am in earnest. Can we not persuade you to let us pay for this picture? For the pleasure you have given us we never could repay you."

"If it is a question of payment," said Mr. [Pg 251] Flint, sinking his voice still lower, "I am so deep in your debt that it would bankrupt me to straighten our accounts. If it is a question of generosity, and I should come to you some day and ask—"

"Did you say it was a Copley?"

This question from Philip broke in upon Mr. Flint's aside. He answered with some asperity, "No, it was painted in England before Copley's time. It is unsigned, but the artist, I should say, was first-rate."