"I am glad that it pleases you, Mrs. Wordling." Her tone was pleasantly poised.
Bedient missed nothing now. He did not blame Mrs. Wordling for using him. He saw that she was out of her element with the others; therefore not at her best trying to be one with them. In her little strategies, she was quite true to herself. He could not be irritated, though he was very sorry. Of course, there could be no explanation. His own innocence was but a humorous aspect of the case. The trying part was that look in Beth Truba's eyes, which told him how bored she was by this sort of commonness.
Then there was to-morrow and Sunday with her away. In her brown dress and hat, glorious and away.
Bedient went away, too.
THIRTEENTH CHAPTER
ABOUT SHADOWY SISTERS
Beth Truba hadn't the gift of talking about the things that hurt her. She had met all her conflicts in solitudes of her own finding; and there they had been consummated, like certain processes of nature, far from the gaze of man. She had found the world deranged from every girlish ideal. Full grown young men could be so beautiful to her artist's eyes, that years were required to realize that these splendid exteriors held more often than not, little more than strutting half-truths and athletic vanities.
Whistler, the master, had entered the class-room unannounced, where Beth was studying, as a girl in Paris. Glancing about the walls, his eyes fastened upon a sketch of hers. He asked the teacher for the pupil who did it, and uplifted Beth's face to his, touching her chin and forehead lightly.
Then he whistled and said: "Off hand, I should say that you are to become an artist; but now that I look closely into your face, I am afraid you will become a woman."
Tentatively, she was an artist; she would not grant more…. A little while before, she had been very close to becoming a woman. None but the Shadowy Sister knew how near. (The Shadowy Sister was an institution of Beth's—her conscience, her spirit, her higher self, or all three in one. She came from an old fairy-book. A little girl had longed for a playmate, even as Beth, and one day beside a fountain appeared a Shadowy Sister. She could stay a while, for she loved the little girl, but confessed it was much happier where she lived.)… Shadowy Sisters for little girls who have no playmates, and for women who have no confidantes.