‘Our advice! I don’t know what that means,’ said Laurie. ‘There is but one padrona in the world, and her advice I always take.’
‘Do not be hypocritical,’ said Mrs. Severn. ‘You promised to paint no pictures, but to be busy and study and do your work; and here you have set up an Edith as big as Reginald Suffolk’s, and you call that taking my advice.’
‘Here she is,’ said Laurie, producing his sketch. He placed it on the table, propped up against the open workbox, and took the lamp in his hand that the light might fall on it as it ought. He did not defend himself. ‘I kept away as long as I could, meaning not to tell you yet; but that did not answer,’ said Laurie; ‘and here she is.’
The padrona put away her work out of her hands, and gave all her attention to the new object thus placed before her; and whatever might be the qualities of Edith, the group thus formed was pictorial enough;—the room all brightness and warmth, centering in the pure light of the lamp which Laurie held up in his hand; the fair, ample, seated figure gazing earnestly at the little picture, with her own face partially in the shade,—behind her the open doors of the larger room, dark, but warm, with a redness in it of the fire, and a pale gleam from the curtained windows. But the actors in this still interior were unconscious of its effect. She was looking intently at the sketch, and he, pausing to hear what she should say of it, holding his breath.
‘Put down the lamp,’ said the padrona after a pause, ‘it is too heavy to hold, and I can see. And sit down here till I speak to you. You have not taken our advice.’
‘I understand,’ said Laurie, and his lip quivered a little, poor fellow! ‘That means I may take away the rubbish. You need not say any more, for it will pain you. I understand.’
‘You don’t understand anything about it,’ said Mrs. Severn, putting out her hand to retain the sketch where it was. ‘Let me say out my say. I don’t want to like it. I wish I could say it was very bad. If it had been atrocious it would have been better for you, you rash boy! But I must not tell any fibs. I like the sketch; there is something in it. I can’t tell how you should know about that woman, expecting every moment to see—— Yes, put her away, Laurie, for a little; her eyes have gone to my heart.’
Laurie put down his creation upon the table with a face all glowing with pride and delight. ‘I hoped you would like it,’ he said; ‘but that it should move you,——’ and in his gratitude he would have kissed the hand of the friend to whose counsel he owed so much. As for the padrona, she withdrew her hand quickly, with a momentary look of surprise.
‘But I have more to say,’ she went on. ‘You must wait till you have heard me out. Don’t be vexed or disappointed. I doubt if you will ever make any more of her. Now don’t speak. I will say to you what I have never said to any one. How many sketches like that have I seen in my life, full of talent, full of meaning! It is not a sketch;—it is all the picture you will paint of that subject. I know what I am saying. She who is so real in that, with her awful expectations, will be staring like a woman on the stage in the big picture. I know it, Laurie. I have seen such things, over and over again.’
Laurie said nothing. He saw her eyes, which were still fixed on his sketch, suddenly brim over, quite silently, in two big drops, which fell at Edith’s feet. Mortification, disappointment, and, at the same time, a kind of consolatory feeling, took possession of him. The downfall was great from the first flush of joy in her approbation; but yet—— Clearly it was of poor Severn she was thinking. Poor Severn, of whom it was certainly the fact that he never did anything good except in sketches. Laurie’s heart rose magnanimous at this thought. If that was all, how soon he could prove to her that he was a different man from poor Severn! ‘It is not worth a tear,’ he said; ‘never mind it. I ought to have known that it would bring things to your mind——’