No more passed between them. But thenceforward Jimmie put the finishing touches to the portrait openly, Instead of painting at it when he knew he should be undisturbed. The wedding was drawing near. The date had been announced in the papers, and Jimmie had put a cross against it in his diary. If only Norma would accept the portrait as a wedding-present, he would feel happier. But how to approach her he did not know. In her pure eyes, he was well aware, he must appear the basest of men, and things proceeding from him would bear a taint of the unspeakable. Yet he hungered for her acceptance. It was the most perfect picture he had painted or could ever paint. The divinest part of him had gone to the making of it. It held in its passionate simplicity the man's soul, as the Monna Lisa in its mysterious complexity holds Leonardo's. Of material symbols of things spiritual he could not give her more. But how to give?
Connie Deering settled the question by coming to the studio one morning, a bewildering vision of millinery and smiles and kindness.
“You have persistently refused, you wicked bear, to come and see me since my return to London, so I have no choice but to walk into your den. If it had n't been for Aline, beyond an occasional 'Dear Connie, I am very well. The weather is unusually warm for the time of year. Yours sincerely, J. P.', I should n't know whether you were alive or dead. I hope you're ashamed of yourself.”
This was the little lady's exordium, to which she tactfully gave Jimmie no time to reply. She stayed for an hour. The disastrous topic was avoided. But Jimmie felt that she forbore to judge him for his supposed offence, and learned to his great happiness that Norma had asked after his welfare, and would without doubt deign in her divine graciousness to accept the portrait. She looked thoughtfully at the picture for some time, and then laid a light touch on his arm.
“How you must love her, Jimmie!” she said in a low voice. “I have n't forgotten.”
“I wish you would,” he answered gravely. “I oughtn't to have said what I did. I don't remember what I did say. I lost my head and raved. Every man has his hour of madness, and that was mine—all through your witchery. And yet somehow it seemed as if I were pouring it all out to her.”
Connie Deering perceptibly winced. Plucking up courage, she began:
“I wish a man would—”
“My dear Connie,” Jimmie interrupted kindly, “there are hundreds of men in London who are sighing themselves hoarse for you. But you are such a hard-hearted butterfly.”
Her lips twitched. “Not so hard-hearted as you think, my good Jimmie,” she retorted.