Chapter 24 - Page 2

furtively in a public place, her every act,
in so far as they were known to me, had been a challenge to
whoever dare assert that she wanted anyone but David. How could
I, not being a woman, have guessed that she was really saying
good-bye to him?

Reader, picture to yourself that simple little boy playing about
the house at this time, on the understanding that everything was
going on as usual. Have not his toys acquired a new pathos,
especially the engine she bought him yesterday?

Did you look him in the face, Mary, as you gave him that engine?
I envy you not your feelings, ma'am, when with loving arms he
wrapped you round for it. That childish confidence of his to me,
in which unwittingly he betrayed you, indicates that at last you
have been preparing him for the great change, and I suppose you
are capable of replying to me that David is still happy, and even
interested. But does he know from you what it really means to
him? Rather, I do believe, you are one who would not scruple to
give him to understand that B (which you may yet find stands for
Benjamin) is primarily a gift for him. In your heart, ma'am,
what do you think of this tricking of a little boy?

Suppose David had known what was to happen before he came to you,
are you sure he would have come? Undoubtedly there is an
unwritten compact in such matters between a mother and her first-
born, and I desire to point out to you that he never breaks it.
Again, what will the other boys say when they know? You are
outside the criticism of the Gardens, but David is not. Faith,
madam, I believe you would have been kinder to wait and let him
run the gauntlet at Pilkington's.

You think your husband is a great man now because they are
beginning to talk of his foregrounds and middle distances in the
newspaper columns that nobody reads. I know you have bought him
a velvet coat, and that he has taken a large, airy and commodious
studio in Mews Lane, where you are to be found in a soft material
on first and third Wednesdays. Times are changing, but shall I
tell you a story here, just to let you see that I am acquainted
with it?

Three years ago a certain gallery accepted from a certain artist
a picture which he and his wife knew to be monstrous fine. But
no one spoke of the picture, no one wrote of it, and no one made
an offer for it. Crushed was the artist, sorry for the denseness
of connoisseurs was his wife, till the work was bought by a
dealer for an anonymous client, and then elated were they both,
and relieved also to discover that I was not the buyer. He came
to me at once to make sure of this, and remained to walk the
floor gloriously as he told me what recognition means to
gentlemen of the artistic