CHAPTER XX
I had worked till the last glimmer of daylight at the portrait, which was now approaching completion.
"That's the end of it for to-day," said I, laying my palette and brushes aside, and regarding the picture.
Joanna rose from her chair by the fire where she had been sewing for the last hour and stood by my side. The morning-room, which had a clear north-east light through the French window leading into the garden, had been assigned to me as a studio, and here, sometimes on a murky afternoon, Joanna, who preferred the bright, chintz-covered place to the gloomy drawing-room, honoured me with her company. Mrs. Rushworth was asleep upstairs, and Paragot had gone for a solitary walk. We were cosily alone.
It pleased my lady to be flattering.
"It is wonderful how a boy like you can do such work—for you are a boy, Asticot," she said with one of her bright comrade-like smiles. "In a few years you will have the world at your feet imploring you to paint its portrait. You will fulfil the promise, won't you?"
"What promise, Madame?" I asked.
"The promise of your life now. It is not everyone who does. You won't allow outside things to send you away from it all."
She had slung the stole which she was embroidering for the vicar across her shoulders, and holding the two ends looked at me wistfully.
"I owe it to my master, Madame," said I, "to work with all my might."