A longish pause followed, and as it seemed to me that there was nothing more to say on this subject until I had seen Thorndyke, I ventured to open a fresh topic.
“What will happen to your father’s practice?” I asked. “Will you be able to get any one to carry it on for you?”
“I am glad you asked that,” said Miss D’Arblay, “because, now that you are our counsellor we can take your opinion, I have already talked the matter over with Arabella—with Miss Boler.”
“There’s no need to stand on ceremony,” the latter lady interposed. “Arabella is good enough for me.”
“Arabella is good enough for any one,” said Miss D’Arblay. “Well, the position is this. The part of my father’s practice that was concerned with original work—pottery figures and reliefs and models for goldsmith’s work—will have to go. No one but a sculptor of his own class could carry that on. But the wax figures for the shop windows are different. When he first started, he used to model the heads and limbs in clay and make plaster casts from which to make the gelatine moulds for the wax-work. But as time went on, these casts accumulated and he very seldom had need to model fresh heads or limbs. The old casts could be used over and over again. Now there is a large collection of plaster models in the studio—heads, arms, legs, and faces, especially faces—and as I have a fair knowledge of the wax-work, from watching my father and sometimes helping him, it seemed that I might be able to carry on that part of the practice.”
“You think you could make the wax figures yourself?” I asked.
“Of course she could,” exclaimed Miss Boler. “She’s her father’s daughter. Julius D’Arblay was a man who could do anything he turned his hand to and do it well. And Miss Marion is just like him. She is quite a good modeller—so her father said; and she wouldn’t have to make the figures. Only the wax parts.”
“Then they are not wax all over?” said I.
“No,” answered Miss D’Arblay. “They are just dummies; wooden frameworks covered with stuffed canvas, with wax heads, busts, and arms, and shaped legs. That was what poor Daddy used to hate about them. He would have liked to model complete figures.”
“And as to the business side. Could you dispose of them?”