He filled his pipe, with a resigned, quiet sadness.
‘Now Grewes—that is my friend who is travelling with me—’ he went on; ‘Grewes, poor fellow, he never realises the difficulties in his path because—because— Let me put it in the kindest way. Because—well, the truth is, poor Grewes has mistaken his calling. No better fellow in the world, you know! A hard plodder: always trying, always doing his best; but—but— You see, that brings us back to what I said just now: art and the artist—where will you find them? and what are they?’
A slight cough sounded in our rear. Looking round, I saw that the long lean man had returned to his easel unmarked by any of us. The Reverend got abruptly to his feet.
‘Well,’ said he, ‘you have a great responsibility. Supreme gifts in a man mean that much will be required of him. So bend your back to it. Good day!’
As we passed by the other easel, its owner looked up pleasantly, but his brush kept busily to work.
‘Don’t go yet,’ he entreated, ‘I am so glad to— But you won’t mind, will you, if I go on with— You see, I have not had very long at it this morning. Spelthorne, he was getting so anxious about the stew, that I—I had to run back to the caravan and— Or else he would have— It wouldn’t have done, of course, to let him go himself. When once he has got into the mood, the slightest little thing—’
He rambled on thus, scarcely ever finishing a sentence, and all the while dabbing away industriously at his sketch. He, too, I had never yet beheld in daylight; but, unlike his friend, sunshine rather improved his appearance than otherwise. It could not fill up the gaps in his coat, nor had it a lustrating effect upon his linen; yet it revealed in his long, cadaverous face, and in his mild, sad eyes, a delicacy, a sensibility, that I had not remarked in them before. As he talked, the old vicar studied his voice attentively.
‘Spelthorne,’ he went on, in his curious, disjointed, breathless way, ‘Spelthorne, his work is so immeasurably— He has such a demand for it that— And I am always so glad, of course, to do any little thing to save him trouble. I—I really think no man in the world ever had a better friend.’
The Reverend was standing close behind him now. He laid a hand gently on Grewes’s dilapidated shoulder.
‘Don’t hurry,’ he said, ‘at least don’t hurry with your mind. Above all, don’t worry: it is all coming beautifully. When did you see your doctor last?’