JUNE’S way home to New Cross Street was beset with anxieties.
Much would depend on what she did now. She felt that her whole life
was about to turn on the decision she had to take in a very difficult
matter.
There was no one to guide her, not a soul on whose advice she might
lean. But before she had returned to the threshold of S. Gedge Antiques
she had made a resolve to get immediate possession of the picture, and
to let this Mr. Keller have a look at it. She did not altogether like
him, it was true. But the feeling was irrational; she must be sensible
enough not to let it set her against him without due cause. For he was
a friend whom Providence had unmistakably thrown in her way, and there
was no other to whom she might turn.
William was a broken reed. With all his perception and talent, he
was likely to prove hopeless now that Uncle Si was setting his wits
to work to obtain the picture for himself. William’s devotion to his
master’s interest would be simply fatal to her scheme. For the sake of
them both, June felt she must take a full advantage of the heaven-sent
opportunity provided by this Mr. Keller.
Other decisions, too, would have to be made. As soon as Uncle Si knew
the picture was hers, he would almost certainly carry out his threat
of putting her in the street; at least she was no judge of character
if the event proved otherwise. A means of livelihood must be sought
at once. That afternoon’s experience of Oxford Street had opened up
new vistas, which, however, might lead nowhere. But even if she could
not get employment in a shop Mr. Keller’s offer of work as an artist’s
model at five shillings an hour must not be lightly put aside.
The first thing to be done, however, was to clinch William’s gift of
the picture once and for all. She made up her mind that it should be
fully consummated before the return of Uncle Si from Newbury.
As soon as William had been given his tea she broached the subject. But
when she asked for possession, there and then, his crest fell.
“I was still hoping, Miss June,” the simpleton owned, “that you’d let
the dear old master have this lovely thing. It has come to mean so much
to him, you see. I will get another one for you.”
“Not another Van Roon,” said June, sharply.
“No, I’m afraid I couldn’t promise a Van Roon.” A cloud passed over
William’s face. “But I might be able to pick up something quite good,
which perhaps you would come to like as much.”
June shook a disconsolate head.
“I don’t think,” she said, in a slow voice, as she fixed her eyes on
the wall in front of her, “there is another picture in the world I
should value so much as that one. I simply love that picture.”
William was troubled.
“The old master loves it, too.”
“But you gave it me, you know.” June was painfully conscious of a swift
deepening of colour.
The plain fact was not denied.
“You mustn’t think me very hard and grasping if I hold you to the
bargain.”
“No, Miss June. If you insist, of course the picture is yours.”
“To do with just as I like.”
“Why yes, certainly.”
June proceeded to take the bull by the horns. “Very well,” she said.
“After supper, I shall ask you to hand it over to me, and I will put it
in a place of safety.”
William sighed heavily. He seemed almost upon the verge of tears. June
simply loathed the part she was playing. The only consolation was that
she was acting quite as much in his interest as in her own.
Uncle Si came in shortly before eight. He sat down to supper in quite a
good humour. For once the old man was in high conversational feather.
It was clear that his mind was still full of the picture. Without
subscribing for one moment to William’s preposterous theory that the
thing was a genuine Van Roon, he had had a further talk on the matter
with his friend, Mr. Thornton, with whom he had travelled down to
Newbury; and, he had arranged with that gentleman to bring his friend,
Monsieur Duponnet, the famous Paris expert who was now in London,
to come and look at it on Thursday afternoon. Monsieur Duponnet who
knew more about Van Roon than anybody living, and had had several
pass through his hands in the last ten years, would be able to say
positively whether William was wrong, and S. Gedge Antiques was right,
or with a devout gesture for which June longed to pull his ugly nose,
vice versâ.
The time had now come for June to show her hand. Very quietly indeed
her bolt was launched. William had given the picture to her.
The old man simply stared at her.
It was clear, however, that his thoughts were running so hard upon M.
Duponnet and the higher potentialities that just at first he was not
able to grasp the significance of June’s bald statement.
So that there should be no doubt about the position June modestly
repeated it.
“Given it to you!” said the old man, a light beginning to break. “How
do you mean--given it to you?”
Calmly, patiently June threw a little more light on the subject. And
while she did so her eyes were fixed with veiled defiance upon the face
of Uncle Si. The thought uppermost in her mind was that he took it far
better than could have been expected. “Given it to you,” he kept on
saying to himself softly. There was no explosion. “Given it to you,” he
kept on. He grew a little green about the gills and that was all.
At last he turned to William: “Boy, what’s this? Is the girl daft?” The
mildness of tone was astonishing.
William explained as well as he could. It was a lame and halting
performance, and at that moment June was not proud of him. But she
was even less proud of herself. The part she was playing, gloss it
over as one might, was ignoble. And William’s embarrassment was rather
painful to witness. He stammered a good deal, he grew red and nervous;
and all the while the voice of his kind and good master became more
deeply reproachful, and melted finally in a note of real pathos.
“How could you do such a thing?” he said. “Why you know as well as I
do, my boy, that I would have given you anything in reason for that
picture--anything in reason.” And there he sat at his supper, the very
image of outraged benevolence and enthusiasm, a Christian with a halo!
“Old Serpent” said the fierce eyes that June fixed upon his face. For a
moment it looked as if the old wretch was going to shed tears. But no,
he was content with a mild snuffle and that was all.