|
Main
- books.jibble.org
My Books
- IRC Hacks
Misc. Articles
- Meaning of Jibble
- M4 Su Doku
- Computer Scrapbooking
- Setting up Java
- Bootable Java
- Cookies in Java
- Dynamic Graphs
- Social Shakespeare
External Links
- Paul Mutton
- Jibble Photo Gallery
- Jibble Forums
- Google Landmarks
- Jibble Shop
- Free Books
- Intershot Ltd
|
books.jibble.org
Previous Page
| Next Page
Page 34
Filled with such an ineffable spirit of content that she would not have
exchanged places with any one in the whole world, she watched the last
'bus load drive away, waving their handkerchiefs all down the avenue,
and singing:
"O Warwick Hall, dear Warwick Hall,
The joys of Yule now homeward call.
Yet still we'll keep the tryst with you,
Though for a time we say adieu.
Adieu! Adieu!"
[Illustration: "THE GIRLISH FIGURE ENVELOPED IN A LONG LOOSE WORKING
APRON."]
CHAPTER VII
IN JOYCE'S STUDIO
The short winter day was almost at an end. High up in the top flat of a
New York apartment house, Joyce Ware sat in her studio, making the most
of those last few moments of daylight. In the downstairs flats the
electric lights were already on. She moved her easel nearer the window,
thankful that no sky-scraper loomed between it and the fading sunset,
for she needed a full half hour to complete her work.
There were a number of good pictures on the walls, among them some
really fine old Dutch interiors, but any artist would have turned from
the best of them to study the picture silhouetted against the western
window. The girlish figure enveloped in a long loose working apron was
all in shadow, but the light, slanting across the graceful head bending
towards the easel, touched the brown hair with glints of gold, and gave
the profile of the earnest young face, the distinctive effect of a
Rembrandt portrait.
Wholly unconscious of the fact, Joyce plied her brush with capable
practised fingers, so absorbed in her task that she heard nothing of the
clang and roar of the streets below, seething with holiday traffic. The
elevator opposite her door buzzed up and down unheeded. She did not even
notice when it stopped on her floor, and some one walked across the
corridor with a heavy tread. But the whirr of her door bell brought her
to herself with a start, and she looked up impatiently, half inclined to
pay no attention to the interruption. Then thinking it might be some
business message which she could not afford to delay, she hurried to the
door, brush and palette still in hand.
"Why, Phil Tremont!" she exclaimed, so surprised at sight of the tall
young man who filled the doorway that she stood for an instant in
open-mouthed wonder. "Where did _you_ drop from? I thought you were in
the wilds of Oregon or some such borderland. Come in."
"I got in only a few hours ago," he answered, following her down the
hall and into the studio. "I have only been in town long enough to make
my report at the office. I'm on my way out to Stuart's to spend
Christmas with him and Eugenia, but I couldn't resist the temptation of
staying over a train to run in and take a peep at you. It has been
nearly six months, you know, since I've had such a chance."
Joyce went back to her easel, as he slipped off his overcoat. "Don't
think that because I keep on working that I'm not delighted to see you,
but my orders are like time and tide. They wait for no man. This must be
finished and out of the house to-night, and I've not more than fifteen
minutes of good daylight left. So just look around and make yourself at
home and take my hospitable will for the deed till I get through. In the
meantime you can be telling me all about yourself."
"There's precious little to tell, no adventures of any kind--just the
plain routine of business. But _you've_ had changes," he added, looking
around the room with keen interest. "This isn't much like the bare barn
of a place I saw you in last. You must have struck oil. Have you taken a
partner?"
"Several of them," she replied, "although I don't know whether they
should be called partners or boarders or adopted waifs. They are all
three of these things in a way. It began with two people who sat at the
same table with me those first miserable months when I was boarding. One
was a little cheerful wren of a woman from a little Western town, a
Mrs. Boyd. That is, she is cheerful now. Then she was like a bird in a
cage, pining to death for the freedom she had been accustomed to, and
moping on her perch. She came to New York to bring her niece, Lucy, who
is all she has to live for. Some art teacher back home told her that
Lucy is a genius--has the makings of a great artist in her, and they
believed it. She'll never get beyond fruit-pieces and maybe a dab at
china-painting, but she's happy in the hope that she'll be a
world-wonder some day. Neither of them have a practical bone in their
body, whereas I have always been a sort of Robinson Crusoe at furnishing
up desert islands.
Previous Page
| Next Page
|
|