The next day at luncheon Erard had a better opportunity to study Mrs. Wilbur. Sebastian Anthon, who was developing the irritability of age, had held that there was no peace in Chicago, and hearing that Erard was expected for luncheon he had slipped away home. Mrs. Anthon had remained at Field’s absorbed in shopping. So the two were left to themselves.
Erard was delighted with this morning view of Mrs. Wilbur,—her serious face alert, her rich dark dress fitting close to the white neck and curling hair. She gave him a charming sensation of being a woman, neither a girl nor a case in social psychology. He would like to paint her again as she sat, her luncheon untouched, eagerly outlining her scheme for the lectures. He also appreciated the capable manner in which she treated the social and financial sides of the affair.
After luncheon, she took him into her private library. The portrait, he noticed, had been removed. When the lecture-course had been settled, Mrs. Wilbur led the talk to his work.
“Of course,” she remarked abruptly, “I understood your plans only generally when we talked about them in Paris. But I have been thinking a lot about your painting less. It has made me sad. Almost like losing one of my own faculties.”
Erard hastened to extenuate his course, and ended lightly. “You have stood by me four years almost. Now I think I can go it alone, as you would say over here.”
Mrs. Wilbur, remembering with a start her promise to her husband, felt relieved, yet protested until Erard explained that his writings brought him a small income. He did not state that the amount thus received was not large enough to keep him in cigarettes and note-paper. She was grateful to him for having saved them both from an unpleasant topic, which must have left sordid reflections.
“And your book,” Mrs. Wilbur continued. “It was impossible over here to follow you closely. One grows so rusty in a few months, not seeing things to train the eye. Then the importance of a new Liberale or Mazo seems less vital here than one might expect.”
That led them on into a long talk, in which Mrs. Wilbur betrayed with less and less restraint her irritation with her environment, her disgust with “drawing-room art,” and with democratic ideals and joys. Erard amused himself by gaily defending her old aspirations. “You should go in for immense charities, civic organizations, education—and the rest of the housekeeping for the ‘people.’ We over there,” he tweaked his head in the direction of Lake Michigan, “are nearly played out. They will either smash all the good buildings, or pull them down piecemeal in the process of ‘restoring’; the pictures will be gone in another hundred years—there’s almost nothing that is original paint now left on the old masters. Sculpture will be locked up safely in museums for archæologists. And Science—that refuge for the commonplace mind—will reign Supreme in a mighty democracy. Science will then go forth with its tin dinner-pail, the emblem of equality, not annoyed by the twaddle of sentimentalists like you and me. Decidedly, you should get in line with your times.”
“Don’t sneer at me, please. I could make every sacrifice—almost—for something beautiful. One great valley, all green at its feet, with a barrier of hills in the clouds and snow, or just one peaceful old English field with a lot of trees. Or a sight of that—this is so silly!” She felt as if tears stood in her eyes.
“No,” Erard paused, leaning over the back of a chair and searching her face. “That is the distressing part of us Americans; we all apologize for such emotions, as if we should be ashamed of having them.”