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Page 9
But the healing power of time works wonders, and in the spring of the
succeeding year, when Paris burst into leaf and blossom, Jack began to
take a fresh interest in life, and to realize with a feeling little
short of satisfaction that Diane's desertion was all for the best, and
that he was well rid of a woman who must ultimately have dragged him
down to her own level. The sale of his mother's London residence, a
narrow little house in Bayswater, put him in possession of a fairly
large sum of money. He left Paris with his friend Jimmie Drexell, and
the two spent a year in Italy, Holland and Algeria, doing pretty hard
work in the way of sketching. Jack returned to Paris quite cured, and
with a determination to win success in his calling. He saw Drexell off
for his home in New York, and then he packed up his belongings--they had
been under lock and key in a room of the house on the Boulevard St.
Germain--and emigrated to London. His great sorrow was only an
unpleasant memory to him now. He had friends in England, but no
relations there or anywhere, so far as he knew. His father, an artist
of unappreciated talent, had died twenty years before. It was after his
death that Jack's mother had come into some property from a distant
relative.
Taking his middle name of Vernon, Jack settled in Fitzroy Square. A
couple of hundred pounds constituted his worldly wealth. His ambition
was to be a great painter, but he had other tastes as well, and his
talent lay in more than one channel. Within a year, by dint of hard
work, he obtained more than a foothold. He had sold a couple of pictures
to dealers; his black-and-white drawings were in demand with a couple of
good magazines, and a clever poster, bearing his name, and advertising
a popular whisky was displayed all over London. Then, picking up a
French paper in the Monico one morning, he experienced a shock. The body
of a woman had been found in the Seine and taken to the Morgue, where
several persons unhesitatingly identified her as Diane Merode, the
one-time fascinating dancer of the Folies Bergere.
Jack turned pale, and crushed the paper in his hand. Evening found him
wandering on the heights of Hampstead, but the next morning he was at
his easel. He was a free man now in every sense, and the world looked
brighter to him. He worked as hard as ever, and with increasing success,
but he spent most of his evenings with his comrades of the brush, with
whom he was immensely popular. He was indifferent to women, however, and
they did not enter into his life.
But a few months before the opening of this story Jack had taken his new
studio at Ravenscourt Park, in the west of London. It was a big place,
with a splendid north light, and with an admirable train service to all
parts of town; in that respect he was better off than artists living in
Hampstead or St. John's Wood. He had a couple of small furnished rooms
at one end of the studio, in one of which he slept. He usually dined in
town, Paris fashion, but his breakfast and lunch were served by his
French servant, Alphonse, an admirable fellow, who had lodgings close by
the studio; he could turn his hand to anything, and was devoted to his
master.
Jack had achieved success, and he deserved it. His name was well known,
and better things were predicted of him. The leading magazines displayed
his black-and-white drawings monthly, and publishers begged him to
illustrate books. He was making a large income, and saving the half of
it. Nor did he lose sight of his loftier goal. His picture of last year
had been accepted by the Academy, hung well, and sold, and he had just
been notified that he was in again this spring. Fortune smiled on him,
and the folly of his youth was a fading memory that could never cloud or
dim his future.
* * * * *
It was two days after the adventure on the river, late in the afternoon.
Jack was reading over the manuscript of a book, and penciling possible
points for illustration, when Alphonse handed him a letter. It was
directed in a feminine hand, but a man had clearly penned the inclosure.
The writer signed himself Stephen Foster, and in a few brief sentences,
coldly and curtly expressed, he thanked Mr. Vernon for the great and
timely service he had rendered his daughter. That was all. There was no
invitation to the house at Strand-on-the-Green--no hope or desire for a
personal acquaintance.
Jack resented the bald, stereotyped communication. He felt
piqued--slightly hurt. He had been trying to forget the girl, but now,
thinking of her as something out of his reach, he wanted to see her
again.
"A conceited, crusty old chap--this Stephen Foster," he said to himself.
"No doubt he is a money-grubber in the city, and regards artists with
contempt. If I had a daughter like that, and a man saved her life, I
should be properly grateful. Poor girl, she can't lead a very happy
life."
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