But it was the execution of the picture which perhaps specially arrested the attention of the men examining it.
'Eclectic stuff!' said Watson to himself, presently, as he turned away—'seen with other men's eyes!'
But on Lord Findon and on Cuningham the effect was of another kind. The picture seemed to them also a combination of many things, or rather of attempts at many things—Burne-Jones' mystical colour—the rustic character of a Bastien-Lepage or a Millet—with the jewelled detail of a fourteenth-century Florentine, so wonderful were the harebells in the foreground, the lichened rocks, the dabbled fleece of the lamb: but they realised that it was a combination that only a remarkable talent could have achieved.
'By Jove!' said Findon, turning on the artist with animation, 'where did you learn all this?'
'I've been painting a good many years,' said Fenwick, his cheeks aglow. 'But I've got on a lot this last six months.'
'I suppose, in the country, you couldn't get properly at the model?'
'No. I've had no chances.'
'Let's all pray to have none,' said Cuningham, good-naturedly. 'I had no notion you were such a swell.'
But his light-blue eyes as they rested on Fenwick were less friendly. His Scotch prudence was alarmed. Had he in truth introduced a genius unawares to his only profitable patron?
'Who is the model, if I may ask?' said Lord Findon, still examining the picture.