“You are getting quite a lot of technical knowledge.”
“I want to be thorough. And Fernhill has aroused an extraordinary curiosity in me. I want to know the why and the wherefore.”
He found that it gave him peculiar satisfaction to watch her fingers moving the brush. She was doing her own work and his at the same moment, and the suggestion of comradeship delighted him.
“It wouldn’t do you any harm to go through a course of practical gardening. It all helps. Gives one the real grip on a subject.”
“I should like it.”
“I could arrange it for you with Lavender. It has struck me, too, that if you care to keep to this sort of work——”
She looked up at him with eyes that asked, “Why not?”
“You may want to do bigger things.”
“But if the present work fills one’s life?”
“I could find you plenty of chances for self-expression. Every year I have more people coming to me wanting plans for gardens, wild gardens, rose gardens, formal gardens. I could start a new profession in design alone. I am pretty sure you could paint people fine, prophetic pictures, and then turn your pictures into the reality.”