“Who would ever have thought Lucy Dwight could have stepped into a picture and stayed there all her life? She did not expect to, once, but she made up her mind to it, later, when one day she looked in the glass and took stock of what was left to her. She was twenty then.
“I am proud of the portrait, frankly. I have enjoyed making it. I haven’t had anything else to do, except, of course,” a ripple of laughter ran through her tone, “to listen! The portrait needed a frame, so I’ve made that, too. Your figure of speech was inaccurate, a while ago. I am not Westbury. Westbury is the frame; I am the portrait, the portrait of an interesting old woman, interesting to everybody but herself!”
Lucy was an artist, she knew the value of the pause, she knew the value of a shrug, the most delicate perceptible lifting of brows and shoulders, she knew the value of hands, that, out of periods of quiet, flickered now and then, spirit-white against the black shadows of her gown. An artist, she forgot the Bishop while she talked and did not look upon the change that grew upon his face.
“It is very easy to be interesting. It only needs that you always guess what people are going to say next and never let them guess what you are going to say next. It needs a gift for words and a gift for silence. It was the process by which I brought up my children. My children have always known they did not know their mother, a course of training easier than spanking and more efficacious.” She stopped a moment. Her clasped hands tightened, “Yet in ultimate effect, at seventy-seven, a little lonely. We prefer our Christmases apart, my children and I.” Her words fell clear against a long silence following, “My husband, of course, spoiled the children. I was perfectly willing that he should; they were his children.”
After a pause, the Bishop, bringing the words forth from far away murmured, musing, “Fathers do spoil children, perhaps.”
Her tone turned tense, “I would have spoiled Nan!” then, resuming her gaze into the fire, upon her portrait, she continued her retrospective analysis, “And I have managed the town as I have managed my family. What Mrs. Hollister says, what Mrs. Hollister does not say, about ministers and missions, about dinners and diners, Westbury waits to know, and I have never let it be quite, quite sure! So Westbury watches, watches me—but oh, not as I watch Westbury! For it would be a little curious and disquieting—if I should cease to be popular! I don’t think that unpopularity would exactly suit—my physique! I am old and accustomed to sovereignty, even if it is, well, a bit monotonous! We were young and lively once, Westbury and I, but now we grow old and wish to be complacent and comfortable, so we don’t poke at each other’s consciences. And, indeed, why should we? For are we not pretty good, when one stops to look at us!” Patriotism deepened her voice, “Where is there another Westbury! We have kept the heritage of our fathers! We have not grown cheap in Westbury!” Then a lighter tone, “And how could we be very bad when we always have had you to idealize us! Ever since you were a boy! You came to us a stranger and we took you in, at once. We sometimes do take in the stranger at once, and sometimes never. Nowadays he must be presented to the portrait, and must pass that examination. Young Murray Newbold has never passed his, and he knows it. I believe I rather like to see him squirm, for it is not petty, it is a giant’s squirming, and I enjoy it because I fancy it has ceased to be perceptible to any eye but mine. It is interesting to observe the effect of the air of Westbury on some constitutions. Your young Newbold would have been worth bringing up once, but he has never learned not to be afraid, and that brings it about that he has parted with every good quality he possesses except his brain. That is still with us, fortunately, for, quite between us, in spite of patriotism, I must say there are not many brains in active employment in Westbury in these days (I’m not, of course, so impolitic as to say ‘in these days’ to anyone but you, Henry!). We have about half-a-dozen brains in Westbury capable of conversation,—yours and young Newbold’s and mine, I forget the other three!” Her laugh died into a thoughtful pause.
“And yet a brain for a woman is a big stupidity. But perhaps I ought not to quarrel with mine, for,” she drew a quick breath of intensity, “it has given me all I’ve ever had! Oh, you and I have had some great old talks, haven’t we, here by my old red fire! Brains make—at least—good comradeship!” Her voice fell low, “I sometimes wonder if there is anything better for—men and women—than good comradeship. What—what do you think, Henry?” But still she looked into the fire and not at him, and the Bishop did not answer. For a moment his deep gaze upon her wavered, went to the blackening window,—below there in the wintry garden long bleak stems broke aflame with wee yellow blossoms, beneath them little brown Annie walked among the roses.
“How curiously that holly glistens, Henry!” Lucy’s eyes were upon the long lean hands transparent to the fire glow, then suddenly in a voice lingering and judicial, “I really do not know whether it is so very interesting after all to be an interesting old woman!”
Lucy’s hands unclasped, fluttered an instant on the chair arms, then lay still, “Oh, I am bored! And I have been bored for so long! It would astonish this town of mine to know how it bores me! There is nothing new for me anywhere! I know what everybody is going to say and do. If it were not for you, I should even know what I myself am going to say and do! Oh, dull, dull, dull,—this being old! I wish I had something to do! I don’t even yet feel old enough to do nothing, yet when have I ever done anything else?”
The fire snapped in the stillness of the room, embers leaping up, the sooner to die to blackened ashes. Lucy’s voice grew low and vibrant.