Three whole days I have worked on that bust, with a concentration of
effort that is exhausting. It is finished--I feel tonight the elation
of a girl out of school. Moreover I can sleep without the anxiety due
to an unfinished work. Charlie is pleased, and I--well I am never
satisfied, but I am conscious of having accomplished my best. His
friends who know his restless and capricious nature are surprised
that he gave me those three whole days. I was fortunate of course
in meeting him immediately in his return, before he was re-engulfed
in work. Moreover, with some perception, I planted myself with my
materials in his house, and as I wanted him bare throated I begged him
not to dress. A man in pajamas and dressing-gown does not suddenly
get a notion to order his motor and go off to some place. I had him
fairly anchored. Nevertheless he has been difficult to do. There is
so much subtlety in the face, and sensitiveness, and all his varying
personalities arrayed themselves before me, and had to be embodied into
one interpretation.
[Illustration: “CHARLIE” IN HIS DRESSING-GOWN ON HIS MOORISH SUNBATHED
VERANDA
(Photograph by Clare Sheridan)
]
Charlie would get down from the model stand and observe the progress
through half closed eyes. Once he said: “I wish this was not me, so
that I could admire it as I please. I find him very interesting, this
fellow you have made!” and then, after a close examination from all
angles he added:
“It might be the head of a criminal, mightn’t it--?” and proceeded
to elaborate a sudden born theory that criminals and artists were
psychologically akin. On reflection we all have a flame. A burning
flame of impulse, a vision, a side tracked mind, a deep sense of
unlawfulness.
Later, as I was finishing, the Comte de Limur arrived. He is a young
Frenchman who is studying the moving picture work, for France. He
looked at the bust, and then at Charlie, and then slyly at me: “I see,
it is Pan ...” and added with a chuckle: “one can never deceive a
woman!”
As I needed to work until quite late, it was fortunate that Charlie had
changed his mind about Catalina. He heard yesterday that the fishing
season closed there on November 1st.
On receipt of this news he flashed a new idea: summoning by shouts
“To-om!” his secretary, he asked: “Can you get some tents? Can you get
some tinned foods? Can you find a location suitable for camping--can we
start on Sunday morning?”
The reply was in the affirmative, unhesitatingly. “Shall we take a
chef, or do our own cooking?” Charlie looked at me, I informed him
that I couldn’t boil an egg. “You ought to be ashamed of yourself.
We’ll take a chef--” he said. And so my return to New York planned for
Wednesday is again delayed.