I
When I met my mother at the solicitor's office next day, she was
astonished at my cheerfulness and at the general change in me. As we
left the office together, she said,
'Everything is now arranged: your aunt and I have decided to accept
Lord Sleaford's invitation to go for a cruise in his yacht. We leave
to-morrow evening. Lord Sleaford has promised to take me to-morrow
afternoon to Mr. Wilderspin's studio, to see the great painter's
portrait of me, which is now, I understand, quite finished.'
'Why did you not ask me to accompany you, instead of asking
Sleaford?'
'I did not know that you would care to do so.' 'Dear mother,' I said,
in a tender tone that startled her, 'you must let me go with you and
Sleaford to the studio.'
She consented, and on the following afternoon I called at my aunt's
house in Belgrave Square. The hall was full of portmanteaux, boxes,
and packages. Sleaford had already arrived, and was waiting with
stolid patience for my mother, who had gone to her room to dress. He
began to talk to me about the astonishing gifts of Cyril Aylwin.
'Have you made an appointment with Wilderspin?' I said to my mother,
when she entered the room. 'The last time I saw him he seemed to be
much occupied with some disturbing affairs of his own.'
'Appointment? No,' said she, with an air that seemed to imply that an
Aylwin, even with Gypsy blood in his veins, in calling upon Art, was
conferring upon it a favour to be welcomed at any time.
'I have not seen this portrait yet,' said Sleaford, as the carriage
moved off; 'but Cyril Aylwin says it is magnificent, and if anybody
knows what's good and what's bad it's Cyril Aylwin.'
'Do you know,' said my mother to me, 'I have taken vastly to this
eccentric kinsman of ours? I had really no idea that a bohemian could
be so much like a gentleman; but, of course, an Aylwin must always be
an Aylwin.'
'Haw, haw!' laughed Sleaford to himself, 'that's good about Cyril
Aylwin though--that's dooced good.'
'We shall see Wilderspin's great picture, "Faith and Love," at the
same time,' I said, as we approached Chelsea; 'for Wilderspin tells
me that he has borrowed it from the owner to make a replica of it.'
'That is very fortunate,' said my mother. 'I have the greatest desire
to see this picture and its wonderful predella. Wilderspin is one of
the few painters who revert to the predella of the old masters. He is
said to combine the colour of him whom he calls "his master" with the
draughtsmanship and intellect of Shields, whose stained-glass windows
the owner was showing me the other day at Eaton Hall; and do you
know, Henry, that the painter of this wonderful "Faith and Love" is
never tired of declaring that the subject was inspired by your dear
father?'
When we reached the studio the servant said that Mr. Wilderspin was
much indisposed that afternoon, and was also just getting ready to go
to Paris, where he was to join Mr. Cyril in his studio; 'but perhaps
he would see us,'--an announcement that brought a severe look to my
mother's face, and another half-suppressed 'Haw, haw!' from
Sleaford's deep chest.
Mounting the broad old staircase, we found ourselves in the studio of
the famous spiritualist-painter--one of two studios; for Wilderspin
had turned two rooms communicating with each other by folding-doors
into a sort of double studio. One of these rooms, which was of
moderate size, fronted the north-east, the other faced the
south-west. There were (as I soon discovered) easels in both. It was
the smaller of these rooms into which we were now shown by the
servant. The walls were covered with sketches and drawings in various
stages, and photographs of sculpture.
'By Jove, that's dooced like!' said Sleaford, pointing to my mother's
portrait, which was standing on the floor, as though just returned
from the frame-maker's: 'ask Cyril Aylwin if it ain't when you see
him.'
It was a truly magnificent painting, but more full of imagination
than of actual portraiture.
One of the windows was open, and the noise of an anvil from a
blacksmith's shop in Maud Street came into the room.
'Do you know,' said my mother in an undertone, 'that this strange
genius can only, when in London, work to the sound of a blacksmith's
anvil? Nothing will induce him to paint a portrait out of his own
studio; and I observed, when I was sitting to him here, that
sometimes when the noise from the anvil ceased he laid down his brush
and waited for the hideous din to be resumed.
Wilderspin now came through the folding-doors, and greeted us in his
usual simple, courteous way. But I saw that he was in trouble. 'The
portrait will look better yet,' he said. 'I always leave the final
glazing till the picture is in the frame.'
After we had thoroughly examined the portrait, we turned to look at a
large canvas upon an easel. Wilderspin had evidently been working
upon it very lately.
'That's "Ruth and Boaz," don't you know?' said Sleaford. 'Finest crop
of barley I ever saw in my life, judgin' from the size of the
sheaves. Barley paid better than wheat last year. So the farmers all
say.'
'Don't look at it,' said Wilderspin. 'I have been taking out part of
Ruth, and was just beginning to repaint her from the shoulders
upwards. It will never be finished now,' he continued with a sigh.