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Page 82
His tone was that of a brother, warm and kind. She responded to it.
"I am doing as well as I could expect. Almost every day I have a
sitter--sometimes two. My friends are very good; they bring me every one
who will come. People seem to like the things I do--some of them."
"Almost every day you have a sitter!" he repeated. "Do you call that
doing well? How long have you been here?"
"Just seven weeks. Yes, I do call that doing well. It takes time to
become established, of course. Now that I have made pictures of many
of the prominent people others will follow, I'm confident. You know this
isn't the portrait season--too many have cameras of their own and are
taking snapshots of outdoor scenes, with themselves in the foreground."
"You don't find yourself wishing you had stayed in the city, as I
advised?"
"Not a bit. I want more experience first. I want to be able to do work
I needn't apologize for when I really begin with a city studio."
"You are doing finished work, in my opinion."
"Not in mine."
He laughed. "There is nothing weak about your will," said he.
"I hope not. I need a strong one."
"Granted, if you mean to persist in making your own way. But I live in
hope that when you have demonstrated to your own satisfaction that you
are perfectly competent to hew out that way for yourself, you will be
willing to let some stouter pair of arms take a turn with the axe."
His tone had meaning in it, but she turned it aside.
"Could anybody take your studio away from you? Even though you don't do
it for a living, but only because you adore it, could you be induced to
give it up?"
"I'm not trying to induce you to give yours up. I'll build a separate one
for you right beside mine, any time you say the word, and you shall
pursue your avocation in perfect freedom. All I object to is your making
the thing your vocation. I know of a better one for you."
She shook her head. "We went over all this ground--over and over
it--before I came away. Why do you come out here and begin it all over
again? I don't want to talk about it."
"I came because I had to see for myself what sort of a place you were
in. I had a notion that it wasn't good enough. It isn't. You can't be
comfortable in it, through the most of the year. Neither can Madam
Chase."
"We can be perfectly comfortable." She spoke quickly and decidedly. "You
know absolutely that I wouldn't sacrifice what is dearest to me in the
world for the sake of having my own way. The little house is primitive,
but Granny can be made as snug in it as in any stone mansion."
"The thing may tumble down about your ears in the first high wind."
"It will not. Dr. Burns went over it thoroughly, and says it is much more
substantial than it looks."
"Dr. Burns! May I ask who the gentleman is?"
"My neighbour across the street. He is devoted to Granny, and had as many
fears as you could have before he tested the house."
"Is he married?"
"Certainly." It was impossible to help laughing a little at his tone,
which was that of a jealous boy.
"Thank heaven for that! I'm suspicious of men who are devoted to your
grandmother, charming old lady though she is. But, in spite of Dr.
Burns's invaluable opinion, I must beg to differ with him. You can't be
comfortable in that chicken-coop through the winter."
"I don't know," Charlotte said slowly, sitting up very straight in the
twilight, and looking steadily in front of her, "that you have any right
to care whether we are comfortable or not."
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