"Children know very little; but their capacity of comprehension is
great."
"I've just been interviewing Tommy on the subject of the pictures," says
Mr. Monkton. "So far as I can make out he disapproves of Doré."
"Oh! Tommy! and all such beautiful pictures out of the Bible," says his
mother.
"I did like them," says Tommy. "Only some of them were queer. I wanted
to know about them, but nobody would tell me--and----"
"Why, Tommy, I explained them all to you," says Joyce, reproachfully.
"You did in the first two little rooms and in the big room afterward,
where the velvet seats were. They," looking at his father and raising
his voice to an indignant note, "wouldn't let me run round on the top of
them!"
"Good heavens!" says Mr. Monkton. "Can that be true? Truly this country
is going to the dogs."
"Where do the dogs live?" asks Tommy, "What dogs? Why does the country
want to go to them?"
"It doesn't want to go," explains his father. "But it will have to go,
and the dogs will punish them for not letting you reduce its velvet
seats to powder. Never mind, go on with your story; so that unnatural
aunt of yours wouldn't tell you about the pictures, eh?"
"She did in the beginning, and when we got into the big room too, a
little while. She told me about the great large one at the end, 'Christ
and the Historian,' though I couldn't see the Historian anywhere,
and----"
"She herself must be a most successful one," says Mr. Monkton, sotto
voce.
"And then we came to the Innocents, and I perfectly hated that," says
Tommy. "'Twas frightful! Everybody was as large as that," stretching out
his arms and puffing out his cheeks, "and the babies were all so fat and
so horrid. And then Felix came, and Joyce had to talk to him, so I
didn't know any more."
"I think you forget," says Joyce. "There was that picture with lions in
it. Mr. Dysart himself explained that to you."
"Oh, that one!" says Tommy, as if dimly remembering, "the circus one!
The one with the round house. I didn't like that either."
"It is rather ghastly for a child," says his mother.
"That's not the one with the gas," puts in Tommy. "The one with the gas
is just close to it, and has got Pilate's wife in it. She's very nice."
"But why didn't you like the other?" asks his father. "I think it one of
the best there."
"Well, I don't," says Tommy, evidently grieved at having to differ from
his father; but filled with a virtuous determination to stick to the
truth through thick and thin.
"No?"
"'Tis unfair," says Tommy.
"That has been allowed for centuries," says his father.
"Then why don't they change it?"
"Change what?" asks Mr. Monkton, feeling a little puzzled. "How can one
change now the detestable cruelties--or the abominable habits of the
dark ages?"
"But why were they dark?" asks Tommy. "Mammy says they had gas then."
"I didn't mean that, I----" his mother is beginning, but Monkton stops
her with a despairing gesture.
"Don't," says he. "It would take a good hour by the slowest clock. Let
him believe there was electric light then if he chooses."
"Well, but why can't they change it?" persists Tommy, who is evidently
full of the picture in question.
"I have told you."
"But the painter man could change it."
"I am afraid not, Tommy. He is dead."
"Why didn't he do it before he died then? Why didn't somebody show him
what to do?"
"I don't fancy he wanted any hints. And besides, he had to be true to
his ideal. It was a terrible time. They did really throw the Christians
to the lions, you know."
"Of course I know that," says Tommy with a superior air. "But why didn't
they cast another one?"
"Eh?" says Mr. Monkton.
"That's why it's unfair!" says Tommy. "There is one poor lion there, and
he hasn't got any Christian! Why didn't Mr. Dory give him one?"
Tableau!
"Barbara!" says Mr. Monkton faintly, after a long pause. "Is there any
brandy in the house?"
But Barbara is looking horrified.
"It is shocking," she says. "Why should he take such a twisted view of
it. He has always been a kind-hearted child; and now----"
"Well. He has been kind-hearted to the lions," says Mr. Monkton. "No one
can deny that."
"Oh! if you persist in encouraging him. Freddy!" says his wife with
tears in her eyes.
"Believe me, Barbara," breaks in Joyce at this moment, "it is a mistake
to be soft-hearted in this world." There is something bright but
uncomfortable in the steady gaze she directs at her sister. "One should
be hard, if one means to live comfortably."
"Will you take me soon again to see pictures?" asks Tommy, running to
Joyce and scrambling upon the seat she is occupying. "Do!"
"But if you dislike them so much."
"Only some. And other places may be funnier. What day will you take me?"
"I don't think I shall again make an arrangement beforehand," says
Joyce, rising, and placing Tommy on the ground very gently. "Some
morning just before we start, you and I, we will make our plans."
She does not look at Barbara this time, but her tone is eloquent.
Barbara looks at her, however, with eyes full of reproach.