Jill looked anxious. Long since she had guessed the secret hope in the schoolboy's heart. But she knew it was not a paying profession and where was the money to come from for it?
Her mother—a typical soldier's wife—held a curious contempt for the artist class. She wanted Roddy to go to Sandhurst, if means permitted, with the idea of the Indian Army in the future.
How would she take this new departure?
"D'you remember," said Roddy suddenly, "that old fellow up at Whitby we used to see painting near the harbour?"
"Who took you up with him on the moors, that moonlight night, to the Abbey?—Yes—why?" She sat down, leaning her elbows on the table.
"Well—he taught me an awful lot. Not exactly painting, you know, but to use my eyes. I can't explain! Values of light and shade—such as the sea, with its colour merely a question of depth and reflection ... not dyed water! I showed him, at last, some of my sketches and—Jill——" the boy looked up wistfully, struggling with a sudden shyness—"he said ... he thought—well, I'd got it in me."
"I know you have." Jill nodded. Into her thoughtful eyes there came a look of strong determination. "And I'll do all I can—you know that, Roddy."
"You always were a brick," said the boy.
He stared ahead through the open window.
"There's such an awful lot to learn—and I want to begin—you must start young. I remember he said to me one day—I've never forgotten it, somehow—'I've been painting now for fifty years—and I'm just beginning to master my art. I know that my hand is one with my brain and the long apprenticeship is past. And now'—he looked so awfully sad—'there are just a few years left and then I shall die—and it's all over'!"