March brought John Kendal back to town with a few Devonshire
studies and a kindling discontent with the three subjects
he had in hand for the May exhibitions. It spread over
everything he had done for the last six months when he
found himself alone with his canvases and whole-hearted
toward them. He recognized that he had been dividing
his interest, that his ambition had suffered, that his
hand did not leap as it had before at the suggestion of
some lyric or dramatic possibility of color. He even
fancied that his drawing, which was his vulnerable point,
had worsened. He worked strenuously for days without
satisfying himself that he had recovered ground appreciably,
and then came desperately to the conclusion that he wanted
the stimulus of a new idea, a subject altogether
disassociated with anything he had done. It was only, he
felt, when his spirit was wholly in bondage to the charm
of his work that he could do it well, and he needed to
be bound afresh. Literally, he told himself, the only
thing he had painted in months that pleased him was that
mere sketch, from memory, of the Halifax drawing-room
episode. He dragged it out and looked at it, under its
damaging red stripes, with enthusiasm. Whatever she did
with herself, he thought, Elfrida Bell was curiously
satisfying from an artistic point of view. He fell into
a train of meditation, which quickened presently into a
practical idea that set him striding up and down the room.
"I believe she would be delighted!" he said aloud, coming
to a sudden standstill; "and, by Jove, it would be a kind
of reparation!"
He delved into an abysmal cupboard for a crusted pen and
a cobwebby bottle of ink, and was presently sitting among
the fragments of three notes addressed, one after the
other, to "Dear Miss Bell." In the end he wrote a single
line without any formality whatever, and when Elfrida
opened it an hour later she read:
"Will you let me paint your portrait for the Academy?
"JOHN-KENDAL.
"P.S.--Or any other exhibition you may prefer."
The last line was a stroke of policy. "She abhors Burlington
House," he had reflected.
The answer came next day, and he tore it open with rapid
fingers. "I can't think why--but if you wish it, yes.
But why not for the Academy, since you are disposed to
do me that honor?"
"Characteristic," thought Kendal grimly, as he tore up
the note. "She can't think why. But I'm glad the Academy
doesn't stick in her pretty throat--I was afraid it
would. It's the potent influence of the Private View."
He wrote immediately in joyful gratitude to make an
appointment for the next day, went to work vigorously
about his preparations, and when he had finished smoked
a series of pipes to calm the turbulence of his
anticipations. As a neighboring clock struck five he put
on his coat. Janet must know about this new idea of his;
he longed to tell her, to talk about it over the
old-fashioned Spode cup of tea she would give him--Janet
was a connoisseur in tea. He realized as he went downstairs
how much of the pleasure of his life was centering in
these occasional afternoon gossips with her, in the
mingled delight of her interest and the fragrance and
the comfort of that half-hour over the Spode tea-cup.
The association brought him a reminiscence that sent him
smiling to the nearest confectioner's shop, where he
ordered a supply of Italian cakes against the next day
that would make an ample provision for the advent of half
a dozen unexpected visitors to the studio. He would have
to do his best with afternoon sittings, Elfrida was not
available in the morning; and he thought compassionately
that his sitter must not be starved. "I will feed her
first," he thought ironically, remembering her keen
childish enjoyment of sugared things. "She will pose all
the better for some tea." And he walked on to Kensington
Square.