UPR EX LIBRJS COLOR STUDIES COLOR STUDIES BY THOMAS A. JANVIER NEW YORK CHARLES SCRIBNER S SONS 1885 COPYRIGHT, 1885, BY CHARLES SCRIBNER S SONS TROWS PRINTING AND BOOKBINDING COMPANY, NEW YORK. CO C. A. J. OUT OF WHOSE COLOR-BOX THESE STORIES CAME, AND TO WHOSE SUGGESTIONS THE BEST PORTIONS OF ONE OF THESE STORIES, "JAUNE D ANTIMOINE," ARE DUE. There is no Moral in this book. No Purpose is there twixt its covers. In truth, whichever way you look You ll only find a Pair of Lovers. COLOR STUDIES. ROSE MADDER. OLD MADDER lived on the top floor of an artist rookery down in the Green wich region near enough to the Tenth Street Studio Building for him to say that he lived in an artistic quarter of the town ; un der the roof, as he was wont very reasonably to explain, because that was the only place in any house where a man could get a sky light. Catch him spoiling good painting by working by a side light, he would say. There were a lot of other men who had studios in the building. Some of them were old fellows old Cremnitz White and Robert Lake, for instance who had been painting atrociously all their lives, and who all the COLOR STUDIES. while had sincerely believed themselves to be the greatest artists of the age, whom fate, and the public s bad taste, and all the malign forces at work in the world (but their own incapacity), had united to trample on. And with these there were some young fellows Vandyke Brown, little Sap Green, Jaune d Antimoine, McGilp, and two or three more who had not worked long enough to prove very conclusively whether their work was bad intrinsically or bad only because they had yet a good deal to learn. All of these mert snarled and snapped at each other more or less, and abused each other s work, and envied each other s (apparently) less bad fortune ; and, on the whole, were pretty good friends. Of them all, old Madder was the only one who had his family with him : and old Mad der s family consisted solely and simply of his daughter Rose. In all Greenwich there was not a more charming little body than Rose Madder ; probably it would be within bounds to say that there was not a more ROSE MADDER. 3 charming little body in all New York. She was twenty or thereabouts, and as plump as a little partridge, and as good-humored as the day was long. You must have seen her face at least as good a copy of it as old Madder could make, which is not saying a great deal, to be sure a dozen times in the last dozen years at the Academy exhibi tions ; for Madder was an N. A., and so was one of those whose " line " privileges make the Academy exhibitions so hopelessly exas perating. Rose began to do duty as a model before she was weaned ("Soldier s Widow and Orphaned Child," Rubens Madder, A. N. A., 1864), but the first really recogniza ble portrait of her that saw the light was " The Bread-winner " (1875), in which she figured in an apron, with rolled-up sleeves, making real bread at what a theatrical per son would call a practicable table. Since then she had gone to the Academy regularly every year excepting that sad year when her mother died, and old Madder had not the heart to finish his " Dress-Making at 4 COLOR STUDIES. Home," nor to do anything at all save mourn the loss that never could be repaired. It was generally believed that the reason why Madder s pictures sold for some of them did sell was that Rose, even badly painted, was worth buying. All his friends wanted to borrow her, but Madder would never lend her : she was too valuable to him as stock-in-trade. And with the odd hun dreds which dropped in from his pictures, with some other odd hundreds that he picked up by painting portaits things hard as stones, which he was wont to say, mod estly, were good because he had caught completely the style of his old master, Sully he managed to pick up a living, and to keep the frame-maker from the door. It was the prettiest sight in the world to see Rose posing for her father. She had seen too many pictures, and had heard too much picture-talk, not to know that her father s pictures were pretty bad. But she loved her father with all her heart, and she would have died cheerfully rather than let ROSE MADDER. 5 him for a single moment suspect that she did not truly believe him to be the greatest artist that ever had lived. And Madder, while yet recognizing the fact that some few men had excelled him in art, found much solace for his soul in his daughter s unlimited ad miration of his greatness. Therefore, when she posed for him, and with much gravity discussed with him how the pose would have been arranged by his great namesake, Rubens (though, in point of fact, Ruben was the name given him by his godfathers and godmothers in baptism) or Sir Joshua or some other of his acknowledged superiors, and all the while talked heartening talk to him, and gave him with due deference to the interests of the pose sweet looks of love out of her gentle blue eyes ; when all this was going on, it was, I repeat, the pret tiest sight in the world. Vandyke Brown thought so, certainly ; and that he might enjoy it freely, he made all manner of excuses for coming into Mad der s studio while work was going on. The COLOR STUDIES. most unblushing of all these excuses though the one that he found most useful was that he wanted to study Madder s style. This was carrying mendacity to a very high pitch indeed, for until within the past year, Brown had been accustomed to cite Mad der s style as being a most shining example of all that was pernicious in the old school. Brown was a League man, of course, and held the Academy in an exceeding great contempt. Yet now, for hours at a stretch and when he had work of his own on hand that needed prompt attention he would sit by old Madder s easel and talk high art with him, and listen calmly to the utterance of old-time heresies fit to make your flesh creep, and hear for the hundredth time Mad der draw the parallel between himself and poor old Ben Haydon, and, worst of all, watch old Madder placidly painting away in a fashion that sent cold creeps down his (Brown s) back, and made him long to take Madder by the shoulders and ram his head through the canvas. All this torment Van- ROSE MADDER. J dyke Brown would undergo for no better reason than that Rose Madder was a dozen feet away on the platform, and by thus sit ting by her father s side he had the joy of hearing her sweet voice and the greater joy of seeing her sweeter smiles. What was still more unreasonable in Brown s conduct was his sturdy objection to sharing this mixed pleasure with anybody else. When little Sap Green came in, as he very often did, he would fume and fret, and make himself so disagreeable to the little man who was a good enough little chap in his way, guilty of no other sin than of paint ing most abominably that Rose would have to intervene with all her tact and gentleness to prevent a regular outbreak. And it was still worse when the visitor was McGilp. Brown hated this sleek, slippery person most heartily. He hated his always-smooth, red dish-yellow hair ; he hated the oily smooth ness of his voice ; he hated his silent, cat-like ways ; and, most of all, he hated him for his insolence in venturing to love Rose. 8 COLOR STUDIES. Moreover, McGilp was Brown s rival in art. He was a League man too, and at the life-class his studies were the only ones which gave Brown any real uneasiness. Their styles were different, but there was very little choice in the quality of their work. And as each would have been the acknowl edged first if the other had been out of the way, there was not much love lost between them. To do Brown justice, though, mere professional rivalry never would have set him at loggerheads with anybody ; it was the other rivalry that made him hate McGilp coupled with a profound conviction that in McGilp s composition there was a thor oughly bad streak that by rights should bar completely his pretensions to Rose s love. An ugly piece of work had been done at the life-class in the past season, that never yet had received a satisfactory explanation. The pose was a strong one, and both Brown and McGilp had worked hard over it with Brown ahead. On the morning of the last day of the pose Brown had found his study ROSE MADDER. 9 most ingeniously ruined. It was not painted out, but here and there over the whole of it bits had been touched in that took out all its strength, and reduced it simply to the level of the commonplace. The study was spoiled but so cleverly that even the men who had watched Brown at his work were inclined to believe in accordance with the humane custom that makes all of us give a man in a tight place the benefit of every doubt that will make his place tighter that they had overestimated its merits, and that the study had been weak from the start. Brown be lieved most thoroughly though with no more material ground for his belief than the skill with which the changes had been made, and a vague remembrance of seeing McGilp still pottering over his work after the class broke up the day before that McGilp was the man who had played this scurvy trick on him. He kept his suspicions to himself; but, since he held them, it is no great won der that when McGilp was the intruder upon his lounging in old Madder s studio, Rose 10 COLOR STUDIES. needed all her cleverness in order to stave off a storm ! The fact of the matter was that Brown was desperately in love with Rose, and as yet was in a state of anything but pleasing un certainty as to whether there was the least chance in the world that his love would be returned. What made his situation all the more uncomfortable was his profound con viction at least in his lucid intervals that for him to fall in love with anybody was a most serious piece of folly. For all in the world that he had to live upon was the very doubtful save that it certainly always was insufficient income that he made by scrap- work for the illustrated papers, with now and then an extra lift when a sanguine dealer was weak enough to buy one of his little pictures. He had shown this much good sense, at least ; he never yet had tried to paint a big one. He did believe, and he had some ground for believing, that after a while he might do work that would be worth something. In the meantime he sailed close ROSE MADDER. II to the wind, and had anything but an easy time of it. But God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb, down Greenwich way. In that mod est region one may get a very filling break fast for twenty cents, and for thirty cents a dinner ; and Brown was a rare hand at mak ing coffee wherewith to mitigate the severity of his early morning loaf of bread. And, on the whole, he did not find this hand-to-mouth sort of life especially uncomfortable. But he had wisdom enough to perceive that, with out something more assured in the way of a living, getting married was a risky under taking. To be sure, he had " prospects." His uncle Mangan, who was a highly re spected leather man down in the Swamp, had neither wife nor child, and Brown felt tolerably certain that some day or other a fair share of the profits of his uncle s leather business would be his. But Uncle Mangan was a tough, cheery, hearty old fellow, who very well might live to be a hundred ; at which time his nephew would be five-and- 12 COLOR STUDIES. seventy. The thought of an engagement of fifty years duration, ending in a marriage at three-score years and fifteen, was rather ap palling. " E is what you call rofe, very rofe, my friend, such long time of waiting for the love," observed Jaune d Antimoine, sympa- thizingly, when, as his custom was, at short intervals, Brown had relieved his mind by confiding his hopes and expectations and doubts to his friend. " Rough ! I should rather think so ! If you knew how rough it was, you d wonder that I don t end it all by jumping into the river ! " "Ah! but you forget, my poor Brown. I also ave my rose that for I long, my sweet Rose Carthame ; I also am most opeless and most meeserable. And I am even more meeserable than you, for ave I not one wretched rival that most execrable coun tryman of mine, which calls imself the count count ! parbleu ! e is no count Siccatif de Courtray ? I I vill yet eat im alive, vig and all ! " ROSE M ADD EX. 13 It will be observed that Brown withheld from his friend his conviction that he also had a rival in McGilp. Brown did not like to admit this fact even to himself. To couple this man, even in his thoughts, with Rose, seemed to him nothing short of an outrageous insult. That Rose had any other feeling than that of toleration for McGilp he could not, he would not, believe ; but he knew that it was useless to close his eyes to the truth that McGilp was in love with Rose, and was bent upon winning her, and that McGilp was not the sort of man to abandon lightly anything that he had fully made up his mind to do. He was a rival ; and in that he possessed force of character that begot persistency of purpose ; he was a dangerous rival. So Brown was in a melancholy way over it all trying to nerve himself to faith in his success in art ; trying to hope that Rose, too, would have faith in him ; trying not to fall into the habit of thinking what pleasant things might happen should his uncle Mangan 14 COLOR STUDIES. suddenly be called into another and a better world. " I SAY, old man, are you going in for the Philadelphia prizes ? " asked little Sap Green, as he tipped a lot of life-studies off a chair in Brown s studio, sat down on the chair, and blew such clouds of cigarette smoke that presently his face shone out through the mist like that of a spectacled cherub. "I do wish to heaven, Green, that you wouldn t smoke those vile things in here. If smoking a pipe like a Christian makes you sick, then don t smoke anything." " I am," Green continued. " Of course, I know that I don t stand a first chance, for there are several men who can paint better that I can. Somebody else will get the three thousand dollars, I suppose ; but I don t see why I shouldn t get one of the medals. Even the bronze would be worth having. It does a fellow a heap of good in the cata logues, you know, to have a medal after his name." ROSE MADDER. I 5 " And you might wear it round your neck on a string. But I don t think that you need a bronze medal, Sap ; you ve enough of the article already for all practical purposes." " Don t joke about it, Brown. I m quite serious. You see, I have an idea. Don t whistle that way, it s rude. You ve been associating too much with the boys who hang around Jefferson Market. Yes, I have an idea that I think is bound to win. I m going to do the * Surrender at Yorktown. You know I m pretty good all around fig ures, animals, landscape, and marine. The trouble is to get a subject, inside the condi tions, that will bring them all in. York- town is just the card. Figures of George and Cornwallis or whoever the other fellow was in foreground ; staff in middle dis tance ; group of cavalry close up in front on right ; French ships close up in front on left ; lots of landscape, with tents and masses of troops in background. There you have it ; and if that don t take a medal, it will be be cause the committee has not the sense to 1 6 COLOR STUDIES. know a good picture when it has one under its nose." "True," observed Brown, thoughtfully. " What a lucky thing it is for you, Sappy, that Trumbull didn t take out a copyright ; or, if he did, that it has expired by limi tation." "Trumbull, indeed! It s just because Trumbull made such a mess of that subject that I want to show how it ought to be painted. Do you know, Brown, I think that this is the very end that old Temple has in view. He wants these grand subjects, which were ruined in our fathers and grand fathers time, to be taken up by the men of the New School and painted properly. But I do wish that the Philadelphia people had not made this absurd rule above size. What is a man to do with such a subject as the Surrender at Yorktown on a beggarly eight-by-ten-foot canvas ? " " You can get an awful lot of paint on a canvas that big, Sap." "You are a beast, Brown. When a man ROSE MADDER. I/ comes to you, really in earnest, to tell you of his aspirations and hopes, you answer him simply with low chaff. You haven t a scrap of the real artist feeling in your whole composition." And Sap Green flounced out of the studio, leaving Brown grinning at him. But Brown was more in earnest than he had cared to own. He had been thinking very seriously about the Philadelphia prizes, and he had made up his mind to go in for them. He knew that he had no more chance than little Sap Green had for the great prize ; but he also knew, just as Sap knew, that even the lowest of the three medals was worth very earnest striving after. In win ning it there was honor to be gained, and there was money to be made for there was not much doubt but that a medalled picture would find a purchaser and honor and money were what he longed for just now with all his heart ; for these were the means that would compass the end that he lived for Rose. And Brown also had an idea. It was not 1 8 COLOR STUDIES. as big an idea, in square feet, as Sap s ; but it possessed the advantages of having some thing of originality about it, and of being within the scope of his ability. He had the color-study pretty well in shape already, and he believed that he had a good thing. It was a simple picture, and very much inside the eight-by-ten-foot limitation. The scene was a roadway in a dark wood, the fore ground in deepest shadow. Out beneath the arching branches was seen a misty val ley, shimmering in the cool, crisp light of early day, the nearly level sunbeams strik ing brilliantly upon the white tents of a camp. And seen under the bowering trees, but a little beyond them, and in the full brightness of the morning light, was a single figure, brought into strong relief against the dark hills lying in shadow on the valley s farther side. The figure was that of a woman in Quaker dress the soft brown and gray of her shawl and gown in tone with the deeper browns and grays of the foreground and of the misty valley beyond ; a good KOSE MADDER. 1 9 high-light in the white kerchief folded across her breast. She was kneeling. Her shawl had fallen back, showing her beautiful head and face beautiful with the beauty not of youth, but of serene holiness on which the sun shone full. Her eyes, moist with tears, were full of a glad thankfulness, and through all the lines of the face and figure was an ex pression of great joy, humbled by devout gratitude to Him who had brought her safely to her journey s end, and so had given her the victory. The title, " Saving Washing ton s Camp at Whitemarsh," gave the key to the story : the woman was Lydia Dar- ragh, who went out from Philadelphia, and gave the warning that enabled the Continen tal army to repulse the assault planned by General Howe. And Brown was deter mined to work on this picture as he never had worked before. Naturally, McGilp was not asleep in re gard to the Philadelphia competition ; and he also had his mind set on winning a medal and with it, Rose. His picture was more 20 OLOR STUDIES. striking than Brown s, but infinitely less pretentious than Sap Green s stupendous "Yorktown." It was called " Raising the Flag at Stony Point," and in its way it was an uncommonly good thing. The time, as in Brown s picture, was sunrise the sunrise following the night of General Wayne s gal lant assault. In the immediate front of the picture was water, tumbling in little waves which sparkled in the sunlight ; and from this rose sharply the rocky bank, and sheer above the bank an angle of the fort. Stand ing on the parapet, in crisp relief against the green-blue sky, was " Mad Anthony " him self, in the act of running up the Continental flag ; while at his feet a mass of red upon the gray stones of the parapet, and throw ing a rich crimson reflection down upon the broken water below, was the flag of the con quered foe. Over the whole picture was a flood of strong, clear light that emphasized the spirited action and elate pose of the sin gle figure : it was a stirring story of a gallant fight crowned by a well-won victory. Ex- ROSE MADDER. 21 cept that the values of the lights and shades were about the same in both, McGilp s and Brown s pictures had absolutely nothing in common ; and while Brown s had the ad vantage in earnestness and depth of poetic feeling, McGilp s, being bold and aggressive, was much more likely to hit the popular taste. It was known presently among the artists that both men had entered in the Philadel phia race ; but while McGilp made no secret of his " Stony Point," Brown absolutely re fused to let his subject be known. He kept his door locked, and the few men whom he admitted now and then saw no more of his work than the curtain that hung over it, jealously. Not a word passed between Brown and McGilp as to what would be the result should either of them win a medal, but each man knew what the other was working for, and each felt that the other s success meant his own defeat. Not that Brown believed that McGilp ever could win Rose, for he loved 22 COLOR STUDIES. Rose himself too much to fancy, even for a moment, that she could love McGilp under any circumstances ; but he felt that unless there was enough good in himself to enable him to take one of the three medals, his ca reer as an artist might as well come defi nitely to an end, and his love for Rose with it. McGilp, who was cool-headed enough to see in what direction Rose s inclinations were tending, believed that in his own suc cess, coupled with Brown s failure, rested his only chance of having Rose so much as listen to him. Therefore, both men went at their work with all their strength, and put into it their whole hearts. Now Brown was a good deal laughed at for making such a mystery about his picture ; but he knew what he was about, and the laughing did not at all discomfit him. His purpose was a diplomatic one : that he might have a secret in common with Rose. He knew enough of the theory and practice of love-making to know that a bond of this sort counted for a good deal. R OSE MADDER. 2$ As soon as the picture was fairly in his head, he decided that Rose, and Rose alone, should know all about it. So, when he met her coming home from Jefferson Market one morning, he turned back to carry her market-basket, and to tell her the secret that he intended should be his first parallel. And he made such quick work of it that the secret was in her keeping before they had passed the pretty little triangular park where Grove Street and Christopher Street slant into each other. Rose now never looks un der the archway formed by the trees in the little park, and the elm and willow on the sidewalk, that she does not fancy that she sees Lydia Darragh kneeling there, while Grove Street and Christopher Street beyond widen out into the tent-dotted valley of Whitemarsh. Having told this secret, Brown had to steady himself sharply that he might not tell the other secret that lay on the very end of his tongue how all his hope of the prize really was hope of Rose herself. Possibly 24 COLOR STUDIES. Rose had a feeling sense of what he was try ing not to tell, for she talked so much about the picture that he had no chance to talk about anything else. And she was as sym pathizing as even Brown who wanted a good deal of sympathy could desire. After that Brown managed pretty often to meet Rose as she came from market ; and Rose did not resent the persistent frequency of these purely chance encounters. She rea soned with herself that it must be a great comfort to him to have anybody to talk with about his work and hopes, and that for her to refuse to listen to him, since he had hap pened to make her his confidante, would be exceedingly ungracious, to say the least of it ; which reasoning, if a trifle too general in its premises, certainly was sound in its con clusions. And by good generalship she al ways managed that his other secret should remain untold though as the days went by she found this to be an increasingly difficult task, that constantly called for more vigorous defensive tactics. And what still further ROSE MADDER. 2$ complicated matters was that Rose grew less and less disposed to usedefensive tactics at all. Brown put in honest work on his picture. He spent a couple of days in getting his studies on the border of the Whitemarsh valley ; and he got up morning after morn ing at unconscionable hours, so as to be in the Park at sunrise to study effects of early morning light and mighty puzzling he found them ! Luckily, his sister, Verona, was the type that he needed for Lydia Darragh, and she posed for him with all the good-will in the world ; and nobody knows what a deal of good-will is required in posing until after trying it for a while. Under Verona s protection, Rose saw the picture now and then, and so was able to talk about it considerately with Brown in the course of their walks. And these walks came to be a good deal prolonged ; for Brown developed a notable tendency for taking the wrong turns when they were go ing home, so that when they thought they were in Grove Street, they suddenly would 26 COLOR STUDIES. find themselves drifting down on Abingdon Place. After all, though, these mistakes were not unnatural, when you come to think what a desperately crooked region Green wich is. That people should go astray in a part of the town so hopelessly topsy-turvy, that in it Fourth Street crosses Tenth Street at right angles, need not be a matter for sur prise. What was a little surprising, though, was that it did not occur to Rose that inas much as Verona now knew all about the picture, Brown no longer stood in very ur gent need of herself as a confidante. But it certainly is a fact that this view of the situa tion never once crossed her mind. McGilp s " Stony Point/ meanwhile, was getting along pretty well, too. The man had a great deal of facility, and more than a fair allowance of talent ; and he never had worked so hard as he was working now. Little Sap Green, who had a great fondness for know ing all that was going on, paid frequent visits to his studio, and volunteered statements of the results of his observations to Brown : ROSE MADDER. 2/ " It s not as good as * Yorktown, of course, but it s a mighty good picture, Van. He s got in his lights and shades in a way that I don t believe I could improve on myself, and there s lots of tremendous color, and the fig ure is as strong as a house. He s booked for a medal as sure as I am ; and I do hope, old man, that this thing of yours you re so dark about will get the third. Of course, you know, Brown, that I don t a bit like having to run my work against yours in this way. But I can t help it, you know ; and I hope that if I win, and you don t, you wont have any ill-feeling about it. And, I say, Brown, what are you going to do about a frame ? I ve been to see Keyes & Stretcher, and the brutes absolutely refuse to let me have one unless I pay cash down ; and for a ten-by- eight they want eighty dollars. They might as well ask me to pony up a thousand ! I offered Keyes a lien on the picture, and he had the indecency to say that the security undoubtedly was big enough, but it wasn t marketable. Do you know, I m half sorry I 28 COLOR STUDIES. didn t paint * Washington on his Death-bed on a forty-by-sixty? I ve got a forty-by- sixty frame on my Hector at the Gates of Troy/ and I might just as well have saved money by using it over again. " So the summer drifted along pleasantly, and Brown s picture daily came nearer to be ing what he wanted it to be. He knew, of course, that he never could realize his ideal, but he also knew that his picture was intrin sically good. It was a long way ahead of anything that he had ever done. Verona, who was not a bad judge of a picture, ap proved it ; and, what was more to the pur pose, so did Rose. By the end of August it practically was finished, leaving him a fort night and more for that delicate operation known as " going all over it " in the course of which many a capital picture is hopelessly spoiled. Brown did not know, when he got up at four o clock, on the morning of the 28th of August, to go out to the Park for a final study of the effects of early sunlight, that ROSE MADDER. 2Q the most eventful day of his life had come ; but it had. He was in such a hurry to get to the Park before the sun rose, that he went without his coffee, contenting himself with munching a bit of bread as he walked from the Fifth Avenue entrance along the shad owy paths in the fresh coolness of the early day. Therefore it came to pass that, when his observations were ended with the satis factory result of showing him that the thing he was in doubt about was right he was aroused to the fact that he was most pro digiously hungry. And, being in a hopeful frame of mind, he decided promptly that he would spend the full value of a half-dollar in getting a good breakfast at the Hungaria, before going home to his work. Not ex actly a headlong extravagance this, yet hav ing in it enough of extravagance to give to the breakfast an agreeable spice of ad venture. It was a good while after eight o clock when he got home ; yet, notwithstanding the lateness of the hour, he began the ascent of 3O COLOR STUDIES. the stairs leisurely, and with the air of a man, who, having breakfasted well, is con tented with himself and all the world. But at the third step his movements suddenly were vastly accelerated. From one of the floors above him sounded a scream and a cry for help and the voice crying for help was the voice of his Rose ! He went up the steps three at a time, hearing as he went yet more screams, and the sound of opening doors, and of hurrying feet, which showed that everybody in the building was aroused. And when he got to the fourth floor he found that his own studio was the centre of the commotion and a pretty kettle of fish he found there ! The easel, with Lydia Darragh upon it, was lying flat upon the floor, and in front of it look ing, as he has since told her, like a delight ful, blue-eyed, enraged lioness, defending her cubs was Rose. She had her big pie- making apron on, and her sleeves were rolled up, and she had dabs of flour all over her (for the life of him he could not keep a grin- ROSE MADDER. 31 ning recollection of her father s horrible "Bread-winner" out of his mind), and in 1 one of her beautiful, plump arms was a red gash, and all her lovely arm was bloody, and there was blood upon her floury apron and on the floor. A little on one side was old Cremnitz White he was a big old fellow, with lots of strength left in him with his hand twisted so tight in McGilp s collar that McGilp s sleek face was growing purple, and his eyes were protruding ominously ; and old Cremnitz s long gray beard was fairly wagging with righteous rage. Madder was doing his best to make Cremnitz let go for the life was being choked out of McGilp rapidly and little Sap Green was dancing around the room in a perfect whirl of excite ment, and saying at every step, " Oh, dear ! " Three or four other men entered the room at Brown s heels, and stopped just inside the doorway, in wonder of what the dickens it all could mean. It was not a time for standing on ceremony. Brown had Rose in his arms in a moment. 32 COLOR STUDIES. " My darling ! What has happened ? " And for answer Rose threw her arms around his neck (the coat with the blood stain on the left shoulder he will cherish to his dying day), and laid her head down on his breast, and sobbed forth : "He the wicked villain! Oh! he s ruined it. But but, indeed, I did my best to stop him. To think of poor, dear Lydia Darragh with her two lovely eyes poked out, and the rest of her all cut to pieces ! Oh, the wretch ! Please, please let Mr. White choke him, papa. But no matter if you have lost the medal, dear, you you shall have me all the same. For I love you with all my heart, and I hate him, and I always have hated him. There ! " (From which utterance, especially from that part of it re lating to herself and the medals, the infer ence is a fair one that Verona Brown had chatterboxed away her brother s secret to Rose, so that for ever so long it had been no secret at all !) " Now, sir ! What have you got to say ROSE MADDER. 33 for yourself? " asked old Madder, sternly. He had managed to drag Cremnitz off by this time, and McGilp stood in one corner of the room gasping and rubbing his throat with his hand. (It was a month and more before he could swallow anything without a painful reminder of the exceeding boniness of Cremnitz s knuckles.) " Nothing that will do any good. I m beaten, among you all, and that s the end of it. But I will say this, though : I didn t mean to cut Brown s picture when I came in here. I didn t mean to come in here at all. He went out in a hurry, I suppose, for as I came along the passage I found his door open. I knew that he had gone out, for he waked me up with his confounded noise, and I had heard him go down-stairs. So I knew that he couldn t stop me, and I came in to see his picture. When I found that it was better than mine for it was better, a good deal better I couldn t help what I did. I knew that if either of us got one of the Philadelphia medals, it would not be me ; 3 34 COLOR STUDIES. and I knew what that meant for both of us. You don t know what it would have meant, and I don t intend to tell you. I got into a rage over it all, and the first thing that I knew I had picked up his palette-knife, and had run it through the picture a dozen times. Then she came down-stairs, and saw me through the open door, and what I was do ing, and came in and tried to stop me. I was nearly crazy, I suppose, for ,1 fought with her, and somehow she got that cut in her arm. I don t imagine that any of you, even now, think that I cut her on purpose. Then White came in and grabbed me, and the rest of you after him, and you know what happened better than I do, for he came precious near to murdering me. "And, now, what are you going to do with me ? Take me around to the Jefferson Market Police Court, and charge me with aggravated assault and battery ? You can do it if you want to. You are on top." There was a rather awkward pause after this direct question. Certainly, the course ROSE MADDER. 35 that McGilp suggested was the proper one to take ; but nobody, except Cremnitz White, wanted to take it. For bringing Rose into a police court, and her name into the news papers, was not to be thought of. And so, when Rose her father had washed her arm in Brown s basin, and had Jet Brown help him, and they were tying up the cut in clean paint-rags said to let him go, every body but Cremnitz felt relieved. Half swaggering, half slinking, McGilp went out of the room ; and enough de cency remained in him to make him leave town forthwith. His unfinished " Stony Point " went with him. Presumably, he did not complete it, for when the Phila delphia exhibition opened it was not there. As he went down the stairs, Cremnitz White looked reproachfully at Madder, and ex claimed : " Ach, mein Gott, Madter ! Fhy dit yoo shoost not let me shoke him, and pe done mit it ? For him shoking woult haf been most goot most goot inteed ! " 36 COLOR STUDIES. So " Saving Washington s Camp at White- marsh " never entered into the Philadelphia competition at all. It was not, to be sure, quite so badly cut up as Rose in her excite ment had declared it to be ; but it was so far gone that exhibiting it in public was not to be thought of. However, there was a private exhibition of it the next day in Brown s studio, that bore better fruit than if it had gone to Philadelphia, and had taken the three-thousand-dollar Temple prize. The organizer of this exhibition was Ve rona, and the unit who attended it was Mr. Mangan Brown. Verona, as has already been hinted, had rather a faculty for telling things, and immediately after the catastrophe had become known to her she set off valor- ously for the Swamp, sought out Uncle Mangan among his kips and hides, and told him precisely what had happened to his nephew, and begged him to come up and look at the picture, with the wreck of which, seemingly, everything had been lost. Then she vigorously urged her brother to make ROSE MADDER. 37 Lydia Darragh as presentable as possible, with careful gumming of linen on the back, and with touches of paint on the ragged edges of cut canvas ; and her urging was not wholly unsuccessful. The picture was a sad object still, but enough of its beauty and worth remained, to convince even a very skeptical person, that the man who had painted it had a right to make a profession of art. And Uncle Mangan, who until then had been as skeptical as he well could be in regard to his nephew s self-elected vocation, saw it and was convinced. " I have always thought, Van, that you were a fool," said Uncle Mangan, with a cheerful frankness and a most evident sin cerity. " But now I think that the fool of the family has been quite a different person. So the big prize, the one that you didn t expect to get, is three thousand dollars ? Well, you just shall get it, as soon as I can go down town and write the check. But you must paint the picture over again, for I want it. It s the most beautiful thing that 38 COLOR STUDIES. I ever saw, by gad ! And the directors of our bank last week voted five hundred dol lars to have my portrait painted, to go with the set of presidents, and you shall do that too. And I always have wanted a portrait of your aunt Caledonia, the only sister I have in the world, and you shall do that. And my partner, Gamboge, said only the other day that he wanted some pictures for his new house, and you shall do those. And we want two or three pictures for the new room at the club, and you shall do one of them. And and I ll make it my business, Van, to see that you have all the work you want as long as I live ; and when I die you ll find that you can work or not, just as you please, my boy. And I m proud of you, Van, for the way in which you ve worked along all these years without a scrap of en couragement from those who ought to have encouraged you most. And I m ashamed of myself for the way in which I ve stood off, like a regular priest and Levite, from my own dead brother Cappagh s son. ROSE MADDER. 39 "And now where s this little girl who fought and bled for you like such a regular heroine ? For she will be a Brown, too, before long, and I want to give her the kiss that I have a right to give her ; and that God bless her ! she shall have with all my heart ! " <c THAT I will be the best man of you, my dear Brown, you know well would be to me much joy. But perceive ! " and Jaune d An- timoine slowly turned himself about, that the worst might be known of the many shab- binesses of his very ancient suit of clothes. "And these are beyond all the best that I do own of all the world, my Brown. What would you ave ? For your wedding, in such clothings as these, I should be one orror; one I do not know the English one e pouvantail. And in the small month that does pass before your wedding comes, what can be for me to do that such vast moneys as must be paid for new clothings shall be mine? No, my good friend, e is 4O COLOR STUDIES. not posseeble : though to say such does de stroy my art ! " And in view of this very explicit and very reasonable statement of his inability to act in the premises, quite the most notable feat ure of the wedding was Jaune d Antimoine s brilliant discharge of the functions of best man, in a resplendent suit of clothes that made him the delight of Rose Carthame s eyes, and the admiration of all Greenwich for many, many days. The wedding was a quiet affair in St. Luke s Church, with a lunch in old Madder s studio afterward at which Uncle Mangan made a speech that was all the better be cause he choked a good deal over it, and had to wipe his eyes with a big silk handker chief two or three times, and that came to an end by his fairly breaking down. And Jaune d Antimoine, clad in his garments of truly Oriental magnificence, gave the health of the bridemaids Rose Carthame and Verona in a most wonderful mingling of French and English ; and Cremnitz White, not trusting ROSE MADDER. 41 himself in English at all, made a most elo quent and feeling speech in German, that nobody understood, and that was applauded rapturously ; and old Madder made a speech in which he got miles away from the wed ding into a disquisition upon the nobility and lastingness of Art that was edifying to listen to ; and little Sap Green was the only person present who was thoroughly and persistently melancholy from first to last. There was good reason for Sap Green s melancholy. It was bad enough for him to lose Rose, but it was worse still to know that a blight had fallen upon his hopes of fame : for his " Yorktown " never went to Philadelphia, and his certainty of a medal was dashed utterly, for the sorry reason that he had been unable to pay for the eight-by- ten-foot frame ! JAUNE D ANTIMOINE. DOWN Greenwich way that is to say, about in the heart of the city of New York in a room with a glaring south light that made even the thought of painting in it send shivers all over you, Jaune d Antimoine lived and labored in the service of Art. By all odds, it was the very worst room in the whole building ; and that was precisely the reason why Jaune d Antimoine had chosen it, for the rent was next to nothing : he would have preferred a room that rented for even less. It certainly was a forlorn- looking place. There was no furniture in it worth speaking of; it was cheerless, deso late. A lot of studies of animals were stuck against the walls, and a couple of finished pictures a lioness with her cubs, and a span of stunning draught-horses stood in one JAUNE D^ANTIMOINE. 43 corner, frameless. There was good work in the studies, and the pictures really were capital a fact that Jaune himself recognized, and that made him feel all the more dismal because they so persistently remained un sold. Indeed, this animal-painter was hav ing a pretty hard time of it, and as he sat there day after day in the shocking light, doing honest work and getting no return for it, he could not help growing desperately blue. But to-day Jaune d Antimoine was not blue, for of a sudden he had come to be stayed by a lofty purpose and upheld by a high resolve : and his purpose and resolve were that within one month s time he would gain for himself a new suit of clothes ! There were several excellent reasons which together served to fortify him in his exalted resolution. The most careless observer could not fail to perceive that the clothes which he wore and which were incompara bly superior to certain others which he pos sessed but did not wear were sadly shabby ; 44 COLOR STUDIES. and Vandyke Brown had asked him to be best man at his wedding ; and further and this was the strongest reason of all Jaune d Antimoine longed, from the very depths of his soul, to make himself pleasing in the eyes of Rose Carthame. How she managed it none but herself knew; but this charming young person, although the daughter of a widowly exile of France, who made an uncertain living by letting lodgings in the region between south and west of Washington Square, always managed to dress herself delightfully. It is true that feminine analysis might reveal the fact that the materials of which her gowns were made were of the cheapest product of the loom ; yet was feminine envy aroused yea, even in the dignified portion of Fifth Avenue that lies not south but north of Washington Square by the undeniable style of these same gowns, and by their charming accord with the stylish gait and air of the trig little body who wore them. Therefore it was that when Monsieur Jaune JAUNE D^ANTIMOINE. 45 graciously was permitted to accompany Mademoiselle Rose in her jaunts into the grand quarter of the town, the propriety of her garments and the impropriety of his own brought a sense of desolation upon his spirit and a great heaviness upon his loyal heart. For Jaune loved Rose absolutely to dis traction. To say that he would have laid his coat in the mud for her to walk over does not the condition of the coat being remembered imply a very superior sort of devotion. He would have done more than this : he would have laid himself in the mud, and most gladly, that he might have pre served from contamination her single pair of nice shoes. Even a cool and unprejudiced person, being permitted to see these shoes and he certainly would have been, for Rose made anything but a mystery of them would have declared that such gallant sacri fice was well bestowed. The ardor of Jaune s passion was increased as has been common in love matters ever since the world began by the knowledge 46 COLOR STUDIES. that he had a rival ; and this rival was a most dangerous rival, being none other than Madame Carthame s second-story-front lodger, the Count Siccatif de Courtray. Simply to be the second-story-front lodger carries with it a most notable distinction in a lodging-house ; but to be that and a count too was a combination of splendors that placed Jaune s rival on a social pinnacle and kept him there. Not that counts are rare in the region between west and south of Wash ington Square ; on the contrary, they are rather astonishingly plentiful. But the sort of count who is very rare indeed there is the count who pays his way as he goes along. Now, in the matter of payments, at least so far as Madame Carthame was concerned, the Count Siccatif de Courtray was ex emplary. That there was something of a mys tery about this nobleman was undeniable. Among other things, he had stated that he was a relative of the Siccatifs of Harlem the old family established here in New Am- JAUNE D ANTIMOINE. 47 sterdam in the early days of the Dutch Col ony. Persons disposed to comment invidi ously upon this asserted relationship, and such there were, did not fail to draw atten tion to the fact that the Harlem Siccatifs, without exception, were fair, while the Count Siccatif de Courtray was strikingly dark; and to the further fact that, if the distin guished American family really was akin to the Count, its several members were most harmoniously agreed to give him the cold shoulder. With these malicious whisper ings, however, Madame Carthame did not concern herself. She was content, more than content, to take the Count as he was, and at his own valuation. That he was a proscribed Bonapartist, as he declared him self to be, seemed to her a reasonable and entirely credible statement ; and it certainly had the effect of creating about him a halo of romance. Though not proscribed, Mad ame Carthame herself was a Bonapartist, and a most ardent one ; a fact, it may be ob served, concerning which the Count assured 48 COLOR STUDIES. himself prior to the avowal of his own politi cal convictions. When, on the 2Oth of April, he came home wearing a cluster of violets in his button-hole, and bearing also a bunch of these Imperial flowers for Madame Carthame, and with the presentation con fessed his own imperialistic faith and touched gloomily upon the sorry reward that it had brought him when this event occurred, Madame Carthame s kindly feelings toward her second-floor lodger were resolved into an abiding faith and high esteem. It was upon this auspicious day that the conviction took firm root in her mind that the Count Siccatif de Courtray was the heaven-sent husband for her daughter Rose. That Rose approved this ambitious matri monial project of her mother s was a matter open to doubt ; at least her conduct was such that two diametrically opposite views were entertained in regard to her intentions. On the one hand, Madame Carthame and the Count Siccatif de Courtray believed that she had made up her mind to live in her mother s JAUNE D^ANTIMOINE. 49 own second-story front and be a countess. On the other hand, Jaune d Antimoine, whose wish, perhaps, was father to his thought, believed that she would not do any thing of the sort. Jaune gladly would have believed, also, that she cherished matrimo nial intentions in quite a different, namely, an artistic, direction ; but he was a modest young fellow, and suffered his hopes to be greatly diluted by his fears. And, in truth, the conduct of Rose was so perplexing, at times so atrociously exasperating, that a person much more deeply versed in women s ways than this young painter was, very well might have been puzzled hopelessly ; for if ever a born flirt came out of France, that flirt was Rose Carthame. Of one thing, however, Jaune was con vinced : that unless something of a positive nature was done, and done speedily, for the improvement of his outward man, his chance of success would be gone forever. Already, Madame Carthame eyed his seedy garments askance ; already, for Rose had admitted the 5O COLOR STUDIES. truth of his suspicions in this dismal direc tion, Madame Carthame had instituted most unfavorable comparisons between his own chronic shabbiness and the no less chronic splendor of the Count Siccatif de Courtray. Therefore, it came to pass out of his ab stract need for presentable habiliments, out of his desire to appear in creditable form at Vandyke Brown s wedding, and, more than all else, out of his love for Rose that Jaune d Antimoine registered a mighty oath before high heaven that within a month s time a new suit of clothes should be his ! Yet the chances are that he would have gone down Christopher Street to the North River, and still further down, even into a watery grave as he very frequently thought of doing during this melancholy period of his existence had not his fortunes suddenly been irradiated by the birth in his mind of a happy thought. It came to him in this wise : He was standing drearily in front of a ready- made clothing store on Broadway, sadly contemplating a wooden figure clad in pre- JAUNE D ANTIMOINE. 5 1 cisely the morning suit for which his soul panted, when suddenly something gave him a whack in the back. Turning sharply, and making use of an exclamation not to be found in the French dictionaries compiled for the use of young ladies boarding-schools, he perceived a wooden frame-work, from the lower end of which protruded the legs of a man. From a cleft in the upper portion of the frame-work came the apologetic utter ance, " Didn t mean ter hit yer, boss," and then the structure moved slowly away through the throng. Over its four sides, he observed, were blazoned announcements of the excellences of the garments manufact ured by the very clothing establishment in front of which he stood. The thought came idly into his mind that this method of advertising was clumsy, and not especially effective ; followed by the further thought that a much better plan would be to set agoing upon the streets a really gentlemanly-looking man, clad in the best garments that the tailoring people 52 COLOR STUDIES. manufactured while a handsome sign upon the man s back, or a silken banner proudly borne aloft, should tell where the clothes, were made, and how, for two weeks only, clothes equally excellent could be bought there at a tremendous sacrifice. And then came into his mind the great thought of his life : he would disguise himself by changing his blonde hair and beard to gray, and by wearing dark eye-glasses, and thus disguised he would be that man ! Detection he be lieved to be impossible, for merely dressing himself in respectable clothes almost would suffice to prevent his recognition by even the nearest of his friends. With that prompt decision which is the sure sign of genius backed by force of character, he paused no longer to consider. He acted. With a firm step he entered the clothing establishment ; with dignity demanded a personal interview with its roprietor ; with eloquence present ed to that personage his scheme. "You will understand, sare," he said, in conclusion, " that these clothes such as yours JAUNE D^ANTIMOINE. 53 see themselves in the best way when they are carried by a man very well made, and who as the air comme il faut. I ave not the custom to say that I am justly that man. But now we talk of affaires. Look at me and see ! " And so speaking, he drew him self up his full six feet, and turned slowly around. There could not be any question about it : a handsomer, a more distinguished- looking man was not to be found in all New York. With the added dignity of age, his look of distinction would be but increased. The great head of the great tailoring establishment was visibly affected. Original devices in advertising had been the making of him. He perceived that the device now suggested to him was superior to anything that his own genius had struck out. " It s a pretty good plan," he said, meditatively. " What do you want for carrying it out ?" " For you to serve two weeks, I ask but the clothes I go to wear." For a moment the tailor paused. In that moment the destinies of Jaune d Antimoine, 54 COLOR STUDIES. of Rose Carthame, of the Count Siccatif de Courtray, hung in the balance. It was life or death. Jaune felt his heart beating like a trip-hammer. There was upon him a feeling of suffocation. The silence seemed intermi nable ; and the longer it lasted, the more did he feel that his chances of success were oozing away, that the crisis of his life was going against him. Darkness, the darkness of desolate despair, settled down upon his soul. Mechanically he felt in his waistcoat pocket for a five-cent piece that he believed to be there for the stillness, the restful ob livion of the North River were in his mind. His fingers clutched the coin convulsively, thankfully. At least he would not be com pelled to walk down Christopher Street to his death : he could pay his way to eternity in the one-horse car. Yet even while the blackness of shattered hope seemed to be closing him in irrevocably, the glad light came again. As the voice of an angel, sounded the voice of the tailor ; and the words which the tailor spake were these : JAUNE D^ANTIMOINE. 55 " Young man, it s a bargain ! " But the tailor, upon whom Heaven had bestowed shrewdness to an extraordinary degree, perceived in the plan proposed to him higher, more artistic possibilities than had been perceived in it by its inventor. There was a dramatic instinct, an apprecia tion of surprise, of climax, in this man s mind that he proceeded to apply to the ex isting situation. With a wave of his hand he banished the suggested sign on the walking- advertiser s back, and the suggested silken banner. His plan at once was simpler and more profound. Dressed in the highest style of art, Jaune was to walk Broadway daily between the hours of II A.M. and 2 P.M. He was to walk slowly; he was to look searchingly in the faces of all young women of about the age of twenty years ; he was to wear, over and above his garments of price, an air of confirmed melancholy. That was all. " But of the advertisement ? Ow - " Now, never you mind about the adver- 56 COLOR STUDIES. tisement, young man. Where that is going to come in is my business. But you can just bet your bottom dollar that I don t intend to lose any money on you. All that you have to do is just what I ve told you ; and to be well dressed, and walk up and down Broadway for three hours every day, and look in all the girls faces, don t strike me as being the hardest work that you might be set at. Now come along and be measured, and day after to-morrow you shall begin." As Jaune walked slowly homeward to his dismal studio, he meditated deeply upon the adventure before him. He did not fancy it at all ; but it was the means to an end, and he was braced morally to go through with it without flinching. For the chance of win ning Rose he would have stormed a battery single-handed ; and not a bit more of moral courage would have been needed for such desperate work than was needed for the exe cution of the bloodless but soul-trying pro ject that he had in hand. For the life and spirit of him, though, he could not see how JAUNE D ANTIMOINE. S7 the tailor was to get any good out of this magnificent masquerading. IN one of the evening papers, about a week later, there appeared a half-column romance that quite took Jaune d Antimoine s breath away. It began with a reference to the distinguished elderly gentleman who, during the past week, had been seen daily upon Broadway about the hour of noon ; who gazed with such intense though respect ful curiosity into every young woman s face ; who, in the gay crowd, was conspicuous not less by the elegance of his dress than by his air of profound melancholy. Then briefly, but precisely, the sorrowful story of the Marquis de (" out of consideration for the nobleman s feelings," the name was with held) was told : how, the son of a peer of France, he had married, while yet a minor, against the wishes of his stern father ; how his young wife and infant daughter had been spirited away by the stern father s orders ; how on his death-bed the father had con- 58 COLOR STUDIES. fessed his evil deed to his son, and had told that mother and child had been banished to America, where the mother speedily had died of grief, and where the child, though in ignorance of her noble origin, had been adopted by an enormously rich American, about whom nothing more was known than the fact that he lived in New York. The Marquis, the article stated, now was engaged in searching for his long-lost daughter, and among other means to the desired end had hit upon this of walking New York s chief thoroughfare in the faith that should he see his child his paternal instinct would reveal to him her identity. "I calculate that this will rather whoop up public interest in our performance," said the tailor, cheerfully, the next day, as he handed the newspaper containing the pleas ing fiction to Jaune. " That s my idea, for a starter. I ve got the whole story ready to come out in sections paid a literary feller twenty dollars to get it up for me. And you be careful to-day when you are inter- JAUNE D ANTIMOINE. S9 viewed" (Jaune shuddered) "to keep the story up or" (for Jaune was beginning a remonstrance) " you can keep out of it alto gether, if you d rather. Say you must re fuse to talk upon so delicate a subject, or something of that sort. Yes, that s your card. It ll make the mystery greater, you know and I ll see that the public gets the facts, all the same." The tailor chuckled, and Jaune was unut terably wretched. He was on the point of throwing up his contract. He opened his mouth to speak the decisive words and shut it again as the thought came into his mind that his misery must be borne, and borne gallantly, because it was all for the love of Rose. That day there was no affectation in his air of melancholy. He was profoundly mis erable. Faithful to his contract, he looked searchingly upon the many young women of twenty years whom he met ; and such of them as were possessors of tender hearts grew very sorrowful at sight of the obvious 60 COLOR STUDIES. woe by which he was oppressed. His woe, indeed, was keen, for the newspaper article had had its destined effect, and he was a marked man. People turned to look at him as people had not turned before ; it was evident that he was a subject of conversa tion. Several times he caught broken sen tences which he recognized as portions of his supposititious biography. His crowning torture was the assault of the newspaper re porters. They were suave, they were surly, they were insinuatingly sympathetic, they were aggressively peremptory but all alike were determined to wring from him to the uttermost the details of the sorrow that he never had suffered, of the life that he never had lived. It was a confusing sort of an ex perience. He began to wonder, at last, whether or not it were possible that he could be somebody else without knowing it ; and if it were, in whom, precisely, his identity was vested. Being but a simple-minded young fellow, with no taste whatever for met aphysics, this line of thought was upsetting. JAUNE D ANTIMOINE. 6 1 While involved in these perplexing doubts and the crowd at the Fifth Avenue crossing, he was so careless as to step upon the heel of a lady in front of him. And when the lady turned, half angrily, half to receive his profuse apologies, he beheld Mademoiselle Carthame. The face of this young person wore an expression made up of not less than three conflicting emotions : of resent ment of the assault upon the heel of her one pair of good shoes, of friendly recognition of the familiar voice, of blank surprise upon perceiving that this voice came from the lips of a total stranger. She looked searchingly upon the smoked glasses, obviously trying to pry into the secret of the hidden eyes. Jaune s blood rushed up into his face, and he realized that detection was imminent. Mercifully, at that moment the crowd opened, and with a bow that hid his face behind his hat he made good his retreat. During the remaining half hour of his walk, he thought no more of metaphysics. The horrid danger of physical discovery from 62 COLOR STUDIES. which he had escaped so narrowly filled him with a shuddering alarm. Nor could he banish from his mind the harrowing thought that perhaps, for all his gray hair and painted wrinkles and fine clothes, Rose in truth had recognized him. That night an irresistible attraction drew him to the Carthame abode. In the little parlor he found the severe Madame Car thame, her adorable daughter, and the offen sive Count Siccatif de Courtray. Greatly to his relief, his reception was in the usual form : Madame Carthame conducted herself after the fashion of a well-bred iceberg ; Rose endeavored to mitigate the severity of her parent s demeanor by her own affability ; the Count, as much as possible, ignored his presence. Jaune could not repress a sigh of relief. She had not recognized him. But his evening was one of trial. With much vivacity, Rose entertained the little company with an account of her romantic adventure with the French nobleman who had come to America in quest of his lost JAUNE D^ANTIMOINE. 63 daughter ; for she had read the newspaper story, and had identified its hero with the assailant of her heel. She dwelt with en thusiasm upon the distinguished appearance of the unhappy foreigner ; she ventured the suggestion, promptly and sternly checked by her mamma, that she herself might be the lost child ; she grew plaintive, and ex pressed a burning desire to comfort this stricken parent with a daughter s love ; and, worst of all, she sat silent, with a far-away look in her charming eyes, and obviously suffered her thoughts to go astray after this handsome Marquis in a fashion that made even the Count Siccatif de Courtray fidget, and that filled the soul of Jaune d Antimoine with a consuming jealousy not the less consuming because of the absurd fact that it was jealousy of himself! As he walked home that night through the devious ways of Greenwich to his dismal studio, he seri ously entertained the wish that he never had been born. The next day all the morning papers con- 64 COLOR STUDIES. tained elaborate " interviews " with the Mar quis : for each of the several reporters who had been put on the case, believing that he alone had failed to get the facts, and being upheld by a lofty determination that no other reporter should " get a beat on him," had evolved from his own inner conscious ness the story that Jaune, for the best of reasons, had refused to tell. The stories thus told, being based upon the original fiction, bore a family resemblance to each other ; and as all of them were interesting, they stimulated popular curiosity in regard to their hero to a very high pitch. As the result of them, Jaune found himself the most conspicuous man in New York. During the three hours of his walk he was the centre of an interested crowd. Several benevolent persons stopped him to tell him of fatherless young women with whom they were ac quainted, and to urge upon him the proba bility that each of these young women was his long-lost child. The representatives of a dozen detective bureaus introduced them- JAUNE D^ANTIMOINE. 65 selves to him, and made offer of their pro fessional services; a messenger from the chief of police handed him a polite note ten dering the services of the department and inviting him to a conference. It was mad dening. But worse of all were his meetings with Rose. As these multiplied, the conviction became irresistible that they were not the result of chance ; indeed, her manner made doubt upon this head impossible. At first she gave him only a passing glance, then a glance somewhat longer, then a look of kindly interest, then a long look of sympa thy ; and at last she bestowed upon him a gentle, almost affectionate, smile that ex pressed, as plainly as a smile could express, her sorrow for his misery and her readiness to comfort him. In a word, Rose Car- thame s conduct simply was outrageous ! The jealous anger which had inflamed Jaune s breast the night before swelled and expanded into a raging passion. He longed to engage in mortal combat this stranger 5 66 COLOR STUDIES. who was alienating the affection that should be his. The element of absurdity in the sit uation no longer was apparent to him. In truth, as he reasoned, the situation was not absurd. To all intents and purposes he was two people : and it was the other one of him, not himself at all, who was winning Rose s interest, perhaps her love. For a moment the thought crossed his mind that he would adjust the difficulty in his own favor by re maining this other person always. But the hard truth confronted him that every time he washed his face he would cease to be the elderly Marquis, with the harder truth that the fabulous wealth with which, as the Mar quis, the newspapers had endowed him was too entirely fabulous to serve as a basis for substantial life. And being thus cut off from hope, he fell back upon jealous hatred of himself. That night the evening paper in which the first mention of the mysterious French nobleman had been made, contained an ar ticle cleverly contrived to give point to the JAUNE D ANTIMOINE. 6? mystery in its commercial aspect. The fact had been observed, the article declared, that the nobleman s promenade began and ended at a prominent clothing establishment on Broadway ; and then followed, in the guise of a contribution toward the clearing up of the mystery, an interview with the proprietor of the establishment in question. However, the interview left the mystery just where it found it, for all that the tailor told was that the Marquis had bought several suits of clothes from him ; that he had shown him self to be an exceptionally critical person in the matter of his wearing apparel ; that he had expressed repeatedly his entire satisfac tion with his purchases. In another portion of the paper was a glaring advertisement, in which the clothing man set forth, in an ani mated fashion, the cheapness and desirability of* The Marquis Suit "a suit that " might be seen to advantage on the person of the afflicted French nobleman now in our midst, who had honored it with his approval, and in whose honor it had been named." Upon 68 COLOR STUDIES. reading the newspaper narrative and its ad vertisement pendent, Jaune groaned aloud. He was oppressed by a horror of discovery, and here, as it seemed to him in his mor bidly nervous condition, was a clew to his duplex identity sufficiently obvious to be ap parent even to a detective. THE Count Siccatif de Courtray, as has been intimated, went so far as to fidget while listening to Mademoiselle Carthame s viva cious description of her encounter with the handsome Marquis. Being regaled during the ensuing evening with a very similar nar rative a materially modified version of the events which had aroused in so lively a man ner the passion of jealousy in the breast of Jaune d Antimoine the Count ceased merely to fidget, and became the prey to a serious anxiety. He determined that the next day, quite unobtrusively, he would observe Made moiselle Carthame in her relations with this unknown but dangerously fascinating noble man ; and also that he would give some JAUNE D ANTIMOINE. 69 attention to the nobleman himself. This secondary purpose was strengthened the next morning, while the Count was engaged with his coffee and newspaper, by his finding in the " Courrier des tats-Unis " a transla tion of the paragraph stating the curious fact that the daily walk of the Marquis be gan and ended at the Broadway tailor-shop. Having finished his breakfast, the Count leisurely betook himself to Broadway. As he slowly strolled eastward, he observed on the other side of the street Jaune d Anti- moine, in his desperately shabby raiment, hurriedly walking eastward also. The Count murmured a brief panegyric upon M. d Anti- moine, in which the words "cet animal" alone were distinguishable. They were near Broadway at this moment, and to the Count s surprise M. d Antimoine entered the cloth ing establishment from which the Marquis departed upon his daily walk. Could it be possible, he thought, that fortune had smiled upon the young artist, and that he was about to purchase a new suit of clothes ? The 7O COLOR STUDIES. Count entertained the charitable hope that such could not be the case. It was the Count s purpose, in order that he might follow also the movements of Made moiselle Carthame, to follow the Marquis from the beginning to the end of his prome nade. He set himself, therefore, to watch ing closely for the appearance of the grief- stricken foreigner, moving carelessly the while from one shop-window to another that commanded a view of the field. At the end of half an hour, when the Count was begin ning to think that the object of his solicitude was a myth, out from the broad portal of the clothing establishment came the Mar quis in all his glory more glorious, in truth, than Solomon, and more melancholy than the melancholy Jaques. And yet for an in stant the Count Siccatif de Courtray was possessed by the absurd fancy that this stately personage was Jaune d Antimoine ! Truly, here was the same tall, handsome figure, the same easy, elegant carriage, the same cut of hair and beard. But the resem- JAUNE D^ANTIMOINE. 7 1 blance went no further, for beard and hair were gray almost to whiteness, the face was pale and old, and the clothes, so far from being desperately seedy, were more resplen dent even than the Count s own. No, the thought was incredible, preposterous, and yet the Count could not discharge it from his mind. He stamped his foot savagely ; this mystery was becoming more interesting than pleasing. In the crowd that the Marquis drew in his wake, as he slowly, sadly sauntered up Broadway, the Count had no difficulty in following him unobserved. The situation was that of the previous day, only it was in tensified, and therefore, to its hero, the more horrible. The benevolent people with stray fatherless young women to dispose of were out in greater force ; the detectives were more aggressive ; the newspaper people were more persistent ; the general public was more keenly interested in the whole performance. And Rose most dreadful of all was more outrageous than ever ! The 72 COLOR STUDIES. Count grew almost green with rage during the three hours that he was a witness of this young woman s scandalous conduct. A dozen times she met the Marquis in the course of his walk, and each time that she met him she greeted him with a yet more tender smile. A curious fact that at first surprised, then puzzled, then comforted the Count was the very obvious annoyance which these flattering attentions caused their recipient. Evidently, he persistently endeavored to evade the meetings which Rose as persistently and more successfully endeavored to force upon him. Within the scope of M. de Courtray s comprehension only one reason seemed to be sufficient to explain the determination on the part of the Marquis to resist the advances of a singu larly attractive young woman, whose good disposition toward him was so conspicuously, though so irregularly, manifested : a fear of recognition. And this reason adjusted itself in a striking manner to the queer notion that had come into his mind that the Mar- JAUNE D^ANTIMOINE. 73 quis was an ideal creation, whose reality was Jaune d Antimoine. The thought was ab surd, irrational, but it grew stronger and stronger within him and became an assured conviction when, shortly after the prome nade of the Marquis had ended, Jaune came forth from the clothing-store in his normal condition of shabbiness and youth. The Count was not in all respects a praiseworthy person, but among his vices was not that of stupidity. Without any very tremendous mental effort he grasped the fact that his rival had sold himself into bondage as a walking advertisement, and, knowing this, a righteous exultation filled his soul. Jaune s destiny, so far as Mademoiselle Carthame was concerned, he felt was in his power : and he was perplexed by no nice doubts as to the purpose to which the power that he had gained should be applied. Untroubled by the knowledge that his secret was discovered, Jaune entered upon the last day of his martyrdom. It was the most agonizing day of all. The benevolent 74 COLOR STUDIES. persons, the reporters, the detectives, the crowd surging about him, drove him almost to madness. He walked as one dazed. And above and over all he was possessed by a frenzy of jealousy that came of the offen sively friendly smiles which Rose bestowed upon him as she forced meetings upon him again and again. It was with difficulty that he restrained himself from laying violent hands upon this bogus Marquis who falsely and infamously had beguiled away from him the love for which he gladly would have given his life. Only the blood of his despic able rival, he felt, would satisfy him. He longed to find himself with a sword in his hand on a bit of smooth turf, and the villain ous Marquis over against him, ready to be run through. The thought was so delight ful, so animating, that involuntarily he made a lunge and had to apologize confusedly to the elderly gentleman whom he had poked in the back with his umbrella. At last the three hours of torture, the last of his two weeks of hateful servitude, came JAUNE D ANTIMOINE. ?$ to an end. Pale beneath his false paleness, haggard beyond his false haggardness of age, he entered the clothing-store and once more was himself. With a gladness un speakable he washed off his wrinkles and washed out the gray from his hair and beard ; with a sense of infinite satisfaction that, a fortnight earlier, he would not have believed possible, he resumed his shabby old clothes. Had he chosen to do so, he might have walked away in the new and magnificent apparel which he now fairly had earned ; but just at present his loathing for these fine garments was beyond all words. The tailor fain would have had the mas querade continue longer, for, as he frankly stated, " The Marquis Suit " was having atre- mendous sale. But Jaune was deaf not only to the tailor s blandishments, but to his offers of substantial cash. "Not for the millions would I be in this part of the Marquis for one day yet more," he said firmly. And he ad ded, " I trust to you in honor, sare, that not never shall my name be spoken in this affair." 76 COLOR STUDIES. "Couldn t speak it if I wanted to, my dear boy. It s a mystery to me how you re able to say it yourself ! Well, I d like you to run the * Marquis for another week ; but if you won t, you won t, I suppose, so there s an end of it. I m sorry you haven t enjoyed it. I have. It s been as good a thing as I ever got hold of. Now give me your ad dress and I ll have your clothes sent to you. Don t you want some more ? I don t mind letting you have a regular outfit if you want it. One good turn, you know and you ve done me a good turn, and that s a fact." But Jaune declined this liberal offer, and declined also to leave his address, which would have involved a revelation of his name. It was a comfort to him to know that his name was safe a great comfort. So the garments of the forever-departed Marquis were but up in a big bundle, and Jaune jour neyed homeward to his studio in Greenwich bearing his sheaves with him in a Bleecker Street car. JAUNE D ANTIMOINE. 77 " WELL, you are a cheeky beggar, d Anti- moine," said Vandyke Brown, cheerfully, the next morning, as he came into Jaune s studio with a newspaper in his hand. "So you are the Marquis who has been setting the town wild for the last week, eh ? And who did you bet with ? And what started you in such a crazy performance, anyway ? Tell me all about it. It s as funny Good heavens! d Antimoine, what s the matter? Are you ill?" For Jaune had grown deathly pale and was gasping. " I do not know of what it is that you talk," he answered, with a great effort. " Oh, come now, that s too thin, you know. Why, here s a whole column about it, telling how you made a bet with somebody that you could set all the town to talking about you, and yet do it all in such a clever disguise that nobody would know who you really were, not even your most intimate friends. And I should say that you had won hand somely. Why, I ve seen you on Broadway a dozen times myself this last week, and I 7 COLOR STUDIES. never had the remotest suspicion that the Marquis was you. I must say, though," continued Brown, reflectively, and looking closely at Jaune, " that it was stupid of me. I did think that you had a familiar sort of look ; and once, I remember, it did occur to me that you looked astonishingly like your self. It it was the clothes, you see, that threw me out. Where ever did you get such a stunning rig ? I don t believe that I d have known you dressed like that, even if you hadn t been gray and wrinkled. But tell me all about it, old man. It must have been jolly fun ! " " Fun ! " groaned Jaune ; " it was the de spair ! " And then, his heart being very full and his longing for sympathy overpowering, Jaune told Brown the whole story. " But what is this of one bet, my dear Van," he concluded, " I do not of the least know." " Well, here it all is in the paper, anyway. Calls you a distinguished animal-painter, and alludes to your strikingly vigorous " Lioness and Cubs " and powerful " Dray JAUNE D^ANTIMOINE. 79 Horses " at the last spring exhibition of the Society of American Artists. Must be some body who knows you, you see, and some body who means well by you, too. There s nothing at all about your being an advertise ment ; indeed, there s nothing in the story but a good joke, of which you are the hero. It s an eccentric sort of heroism, to be sure ; but then, for some unknown reason, people never seem to believe that artists are rational human beings, so your eccentricity will do you no harm. And it s no end of an adver tisement for you. Whoever wrote it meant well by you. And, by Jove ! I know who it is! It s little Cont6 Crayon. He s a good-hearted little beggar, and he likes you ever so much, for I ve heard him say so; but how he ever got hold of the story, and especially of such a jolly version of it, I don t see." At this moment, by a pleasing coincidence, Conte Crayon himself appeared with the de sired explanation. " You see," he said, " that beast of a Siccatif de Courtray hunted 8O COLOR STUDIES. me up yesterday and told me the yarn about you and the slop-shop man. He wanted me to write it up and publish it, as a joke, he said ; but it was clear enough that he was in ugly earnest about it. And so, you see, I had to rush it into print in the way I chose to tell it which won t do you a bit of harm, d Antimoine in order to head him off. The blackguard meant to get you into a mess, and if I d hung fire he d have told somebody else about it, and had the real story pub lished. Of course, you know, there s noth ing in the real story that you need be ashamed of ; but if it had been told, you certainly would have been laughed at, and nasty people would have said nasty things about it. And as there wasn t any time to lose, I had to print it first and then come here and explain matters afterward. And what I ve got to say is this : Just you cheek it out and say that it was a bet, and that you won it ! Brown and I will back you up in it, and so will the slop-shop man. I ve been to see him this morning, and he is so JAUNE D^ANTIMOINE. 8 1 pleased with the way that * The Marquis Suit is selling, and with the extra free ad vertisement that he has got out of my arti cle, that he s promised to adopt the bet ver sion in his advertisement in all the papers. He is going to advertise that The Marquis Suit is so called because everybody who wears it looks like a marquis just as you did. This cuts the ground right from under the Count s feet, you see ; for nobody d be lieve him on his oath if they could help it. " And now I must clear out. I ve got a race at Jerome Park at two o clock. It s all right, d Antimoine ; I assure you it s all right but I should advise you to punch the Count s head, all the same." Vandyke Brown thought that it was all right, too, as he talked the matter over with Jaune after little Conte Crayon had gone. But Jaune refused to be comforted. So far as the public was concerned he admitted that Conte Crayon s story had saved him, but he was oppressed by a great dread of what might be the effect of the truth upon Rose. 82 COLOR STUDIES. For Jaune d Antimoine was too honest a gentleman even to think of deceiving his mistress. He must tell her the whole story, without reserve, and as she approved or dis approved of what he had done must his hopes of happiness live or die. " Better have it out with her to-day, and be done with it," counselled Brown. " Ah! it is well for you to speak of a urry, my good Van ; but it is not you who go to execute your life. No, I ave not the force to go to-day. To-day I go to make a long walk. Then this night I sleep well. To-morrow, in the morning, do I go to affront my destiny." And from this resolu tion Jaune was not to be moved. Yet it was an unfortunate resolution, for it gave the Count Siccatif de Courtray time and opportunity for a flank movement. In the Count s breast rage and astonishment contended for the mastery as he contem plated the curious miscarriage of his news paper assault. He had chosen this line of attack partly because his modesty counselled JAUNE D^ANTIMOINE. 83 him to keep his own personality in the back ground, partly because the wider the pub licity of his rival s disgrace the more com plete would that disgrace be. But as his newspaper ally had failed him, he took the campaign into his own hands ; that is to say, he hurried to tell the true story, and a good deal more than the true story, to Rose and Madame Carthame. Concerning its effect upon Rose, he was in doubt; but its effect upon Madame Car thame was all that he could desire. This severe person instantly took the cue that the Count dexterously gave her by affecting to palliate Jaune s erratic conduct. He urged that, inasmuch as M. d Antimoine was a conspicuous failure as an artist, for him to engage himself to a tailor as a walking adver tisement, so far from being a disgrace to him, was greatly to his credit. And Madame Carthame promptly and vehemently asserted that it wasn t. She refused to regard what he had done in any other light than that of a crime. She declared that never again 84 COLOR STUDIES. should his offensive form darken her door. Solemnly she forbade Rose from recogniz ing him when in the future they should chance to meet. And then she abated her severity to the extent of thanking the Count with tears in her eyes for the service that he had done her in tearing off this viper s dis guise. Naturally, the Count was charmed by Madame Carthame s energetic indigna tion. He perceived that his unselfish inves tigations of the actions of Monsieur Jaune were bearing excellent fruit. Already, as he believed, the way toward his own happi ness was smooth and clear. As the Count retired from this successful conference, he laughed softly to himself : nor did he pause in his unobtrusive mirth to reflect that those laugh best who laugh last. And thus it came to pass that when Jaune, refreshed by sound slumber and a little cheered by hope, presented himself the next morning at Madame Carthame s gates, fate decreed that Rose herself should open the gates to him in response to his ring and JAUNE D ANTIMOINE. 85 in her own proper person should tell him that she was not at home. In explanation of this obviously inexact statement she an nounced to him her mother s stern decree. Being but a giddy young person, however, and one somewhat lacking in fit reverence of maternal authority, she added, on her own account, that in half an hour or so she was going up Fourth Street to the Gansevoort market, and that Fourth Street was a public thoroughfare, upon which M. d Antimoine also had a perfect right to walk. In the course of this walk, while Jaune gallantly carried the market-basket, the story that Rose already had heard from the Count Siccatif de Courtray was told again but told with a very different coloring. For Mademoiselle Carthame clearly perceived how great the sacrifice had been that Jaune had made for her sake, and how bravely, because it was for her sake, it had been made. There was real pathos in his voice ; once or twice he nearly broke down. Possi bly it was because she did not wish him to 86 COLOR STUDIES. see her eyes that she manifested so marked an interest in the shop windows as they walked along. "And so that adorable Marquis was unreal ? " queried Mademoiselle Carthame sadly, and somewhat irrelevantly, when Jaune had told her all. "He was not adorable. He was a dis gusting beast ! " replied M. d Antimoine sav agely. " I I loved him ! " answered Rose, turn ing upon Jaune, at last, her black eyes. They did not sparkle, as was their wont, but they were wonderfully lustrous and soft. Jaune looked down into the market-basket and groaned. " And and I love him still. I think, I I hope, that he will live always in my heart." The voice of Mademoiselle Carthame trem bled, and her hand grasped very tightly the bag of carrots that they had been unable to make a place for in the basket : they were coming back from the market now. Jaune did not look up. For the life of JAUNE D^ANTIMOINE. 87 him he could not keep back a sob. It was bitter hard, he felt, that out of his love for Rose should come love s wreck ; and, harder yet that the rival who had stolen her from him should be himself ! Through the mist of his misery he seemed to hear Rose laugh ing softly. Could this be so ? Then, in deed, was the capstone set upon his grief ! "Jaune!" He started, and so violently that a cab bage, with half a dozen potatoes after it, sprang out of the basket and rolled along the pavement at their feet. His bowed head rose with a jerk, and their eyes met full. In hers there was a look half mocking, that as he gazed changed into tenderness ; into his, as he saw the change and perceived its mean ing, there came a look of glad delight. * As though you could deceive me ! Why, of course, I knew you from the very first ! " Then they collected the potatoes and the cabbage and walked slowly on, and great happiness was in their hearts. The world was a brighter world for Jaune 88 COLOR STUDIES. d Antimoine when he gave into Rose s hand the market-basket on her own door-step, and turned reluctantly away. But there still were clouds in it. Rose had admitted that two things were necessary before getting married could be thought of at all seriously : something must be done by which the nose of the Count Siccatif de Courtray would be disjointed ; something must be done to as sure Madame Carthame that M. d Anti moine, in some fashion at least a little re moved from semi-starvation, could main tain a wife. It was certain that until these things were accomplished Madame Car- thame s lofty resolution to transform her daughter into a countess, and her stern dis approbation of Jaune as a social outcast, never would be overcome. As events turned out, it was the second of these requirements that was fulfilled first. MR. BADGER BRUSH was a very rich sport ing man, whose tastes were horsey, but whose heart was in the right place. It was his de- JAUNE D^ANTIMOINE. 89 light to make or to back extraordinary \vagers. Few New Yorkers have forgotten that very queer bet of his that resulted in putting high hats on all the Broadway tele graph poles. When Mr. Brush read the story of Jaune d Antimoine s wager, there fore, he was greatly pleased with its origi nality ; and when, later in the day, he fell in with little Cont Crayon at Jerome Park, he pressed that ingenious young newspaper man for additional particulars. And know ing the whereabouts of Mr. Badger Brush s heart, Conte Crayon did not hesitate to tell the whole story winding up with the pointed suggestion that inasmuch as the hero of the story was an animal-painter of decided, though as yet unrecognized, ability, Mr. Brush could not do better than manifest his interest in a practical way by giving him an order. The sporting man rose to the suggestion with a commendable promptness and warmth. " I don t care a blank if it wasn t a bet," he said, heartily. "That young man has 90 COLOR STUDIES. pluck, and he deserves to be encouraged. I ll go down and see him to-morrow, and I ll order a portrait of Celeripes ; a life-size, thousand-dollar portrait, by Jove ! Cele ripes deserves it, after the pot of money he brought meat Long Branch, and your friend deserves it too. And I have some other horses that I want painted, and some dogs he paints dogs, I suppose ? And I know a lot of other fellows who ought to have their horses painted, and I ll start them along at him. I ll give him all the painting he can handle in the next ten years. For it was a bet, you see, after all. Didn t he back his cleverness in disguise against the wits of the whole town ? And didn t the slop-shop man put up the stakes ? And didn t he just win in a canter ? I should rather think he did ! Of course it was a bet, and a mighty good one at that. Gad ! Crayon, it s the best thing that s been done in New York for years. It s what I call first-class cheek. I couldn t have done it better, sir, myself! " Thus it fell out that half an hour after JAUNE D ANTIAIOINE. 9 1 Jaune got back to his studio from that mem orable walk to the Gansevoort market, he had the breath-taking-away felicity of book ing a thousand-dollar order, and of receiving such obviously trustworthy assurances of many more orders that his wildest hopes of success in a moment were resolved into sub stantial realities. When he was alone again he certainly would have believed that he had been dreaming but for the fact that Mr. Badger Brush had insisted upon paying half the price of the picture down in advance ; for whatever this good-hearted, horsey gen tleman did, he did thoroughly well. The crisp notes, more than Jaune ever had seen together in all his life before save once, when he took a dealer s cheque for ten dol lars to a bank and looked through the wire screen while the bank man haughtily cashed it lay on the table where Mr. Badger Brush had left them ; and their blissful presence proved that his happiness was not a dream, but real. From the corner into which, loathingly, 92 COLOR STUDIES. he had kicked it, he drew forth the bundle containing "The Marquis Suit." With a certain solemnity he resumed these garments of price in which he had suffered so much torture, and, being clad, boldly presented himself to Madame Carthame with a formal demand for her daughter s hand. And in view of the sudden and prodigious change that had come over M. d Antimoine s fort unes, almost was Madame Carthame per suaded that the matrimonial plans which she had laid out for her daughter might be changed. Yet did she hesitate before an nouncing that their Median and Persian quality might be questioned : for the hope that Rose might be a countess lay very close to Madame Carthame s heart. However, her determination was shaken, which was a great point gained. And presently for Jaune s star was triumphantly in the ascendant it was com pletely destroyed. The instrument of its destruction was Mr. Badger Brush s groom, Stumps. JAUNE D ANTIMOINE. 93 Stumps was a talkative creature, and whenever he came down to Jaune s studio, as he very often did while the portrait of Celeripes was in progress, he had a good deal to say over and above the message that he brought, as to when the horse would be free for the next "sitting "in the paddock at Mr. Brush s country place where Jaune was painting him. And Jaune, who was one of the best-natured of mortals, usually suf fered Stumps to talk away until he was tired. " You might knock me down with a wisp of hay, you might, indeed, sir," said the groom one morning a fortnight after the picture had been begun the day but one, in fact, before that set for Vandyke Brown s wedding. " Yes, sir," he continued, " with a wisp of hay, or even with a single straw ! Here I ve been face to face with my own father s brother s son, and I ve put out my hand to him, and he s turned away short and pretended as he didn t know me and went off! And they tells me at his lodgin , for I follered him a-purpose to find him out, that 94 COLOR STUDIES. he calls hisself a Frenchman, and says as how his name which it is Stumps, and always has been is Count Sikativ de Cortray ! " Jaune s palette and brushes fell to the floor with a crash. "Is it posseeble that you do tell me of the Comte Siccatif de Courtray ? Are you then sure that you do not make one grand meestake ? Is it im truly that you ave seen ? " "Him, sir? Wy, in course it s him. Haven t I knowed him ever since he wasn t higher n a hoss s fetlock ? Don t I tell you as me and him s fust cousins ? Him ? In course it s him the gump ! " " Then, my good Stump, you will now tell me of this wonder all." " It s not much there is to tell, sir, and wat there is isn t to his credit. His father was my father s brother. My father was in the hoss line out Saint John s Wood way in Lunnon, you know, sir and his father lived in our street and was a swell barber. Uncle d married a French young ooman as was dressmakin and had been a lady s maid ; JAUNE D ANTIMOINE. 95 it s along of his mother that he gets his Frenchness, you see. He was an only son, he was, and they made a lot of him dressin him fine, and coddlin him, and sendin him to school like anythink. Uncle was doin a big trade, you see, and makin money fast. Then, when he was a young fellow of twenty or so, and after he d served at barberin* with his father for a couple of years, he took service with young Lord Cadmium as had his cousin livin in a willa down our way, and came to uncle s to be barbered fre quent. And wen Lord Cadmium went sudden-like over to the Continent, wishin to give his cousin the slip, havin got sick of her, Stumps he went along. That s a mat ter of ten years ago, sir, and blessed if I ve laid eyes on him since until I seed him here in New York to-day. Uncle died better n two year back, aunt havin died fust, and he left a tidy pot of money to Stumps ; and I did hear that Stumps, who d been barberin in Paris, had giv up work when he got the cash and had set up to be a gentleman, but 96 COLOR STUDIES. I didn t know as he d set up to be a count too. The like of this I never did see ! " " And you are, then, sure, you will swear, my good Stump, that this are the same man ? " " Swear, sir ! I ll swear to it high and low and all day long ! But I must be goin , sir. You will please to remember that the hoss will be ready for you at ten o clock to-morrow mornin , sharp." Jaune rushed down to Vandyke Brown s studio for counsel as to whether he should go at once to the Count s lodgings and charge him with fraud to his face, or should make the charge first to Madame Carthame. But Brown was out. Nor was he in old Madder s studio, though about this time he was much more likely to be there than in his own. Old Madder said that Brown had taken Rose over to Brooklyn, to the Philharmonic, and he believed that they were going to dinner at Mr. Mangan Brown s afterward, and would not be in till late ; and he seemed to be pretty grumpy about it. JAUNE irANTIMOINE. 9/ Jaune fumed and fretted away what was left of the afternoon and a good part of the evening. At last Brown and Rose came home, and Brown, with a very bad grace, suffered himself to be led away from old Madder s threshold. To do him justice, though, when he had heard the story that Jaune had to tell, he was all eagerness. His advice was to make the attack instantly ; and without more words they set off to gether, walking briskly through the chill air of the late October night. As they were passing along Macdougal Street midway between Bleecker and Hous ton, in front of the row of pretty houses with verandas all over their fronts Jaune sud denly gripped Brown s arm and drew him quickly within one of the little front yards and into the shadow of the high iron steps. "Look!" he said. On the other side of the street, in the light of the gas-lamp that stands in the centre of the block, was the Count himself. For the moment that he was beneath the 7 98 COLOR STUDIES. gas-lamp they saw him clearly. His face was set in an expression of gloomy sternness ; his rapid, resolute walk indicated a definite purpose ; he carried a little bundle in his hand. " What a villain he looks ! " whispered Brown. " Upon my soul, I do believe that he is going to murder somebody ! " " Ah ! the vile animal ! We will pursue," answered Jaune, also in a whisper. Giving the Count a start of a dozen house fronts, they stepped out from their retreat and followed him cautiously. He walked quickly up Macdougal Street until he came out on Washington Square. For a moment he paused by Sam Wah s laundry and then turned sharply to the left along Fourth Street. At a good pace he crossed Sixth Avenue, swung around the curve that Fourth Street makes before beginning its preposter ous journey northward, went on past the three little balconied houses whose fronts are on Washington Place, and so came out upon the open space where Washington Place and JAUNE D ANTIMOINE. 99 Barrow Street and Fourth Street all run into each other. It was hereabouts that Wouter Van Twiller had his tobacco farm a trifle less than two centuries ago. The Count stopped, as though to get his bearings ; and while they waited for him to go on, Brown nudged Jaune to look at the delightfully picturesque frame house, set in a deep niche between two high brick houses, with the wooden stair elbowing up its out side to its third story. It came out wonder fully well in the moonlight, but Jaune was too much excited even to glance at it. At the next group of corners where Fourth Street crosses Grove and Christopher Streets at the point where they go sidling into each other along the slanting lines of the little park the Count halted again. Evidently, the exceeding crookedness of Greenwich Village puzzled him as well it might. Presently a Christopher-Street car came along and set him straight ; and thus guided, he started resolutely westward, as though heading for the river. 100 COLOR STUDIES. " Is it posseeble that he goes imself to drown ? " suggested d Antimoine. " No such good luck," Brown answered shortly. Coming out on what used to be called " the Strand "West Street they call it now the Count bore away from the lights of the Hoboken Ferry and from the guarded docks of the White Star and Anchor lines of steamers, skirted the fleet of oyster boats, and so came to the quiet pier at the foot of Perry Street, where the hay barges unload. This pier runs a long way out into the river, for it is a part of what was called Sapo- kamikke Point in Indian times. The Count stopped and looked cautiously around him, but his pursuers promptly crouched behind a dray and became invisible. As he went out upon the pier, though, they were close upon his heels walking noiselessly over the loose hay and keeping themselves hidden in the shadow of the barges and behind the piles of bales. At the very end of the pier he stopped. Jaune JA UNE D A NTIMOINE. and Brown, hidden by a bale of hay, were within five feet of him. Their hearts were beating tremendously. There had been no tragical purpose in their minds when they started, but it certainly did look now as though they were in the thick of a tragedy. In the crisp October moonlight the Count s face shone deathly pale ; they could see the fingers of his right hand working convul sively ; they could hear his labored breath ing. Below him was the deep, black water, lapping and rippling as the swirl of the tide sucked it into the dark, slimy recesses among the piles. In its bosom was horrible death. The Count stepped out upon the very edge of the pier and gazed wofully down upon the swelling waters. His dismal purpose no longer admitted of doubt. Involuntarily the two followed him until they were close at his back. Little as they loved him, they could not suffer him thus despairingly to leave the world. But instead of casting himself over the edge of the pier, the Count slowly raised the IO2 COLOR STUDIES. hand that held the bundle, with the obvious intention of throwing the bundle and what ever was the evil secret that it contained into the river s depths. Quick as thought, Brown had seized the upraised arm, and Jaune had settled upon the other arm with a grip like a vise. " No you don t, my boy ! Let s see what it is before it goes overboard. Hold fast, d Antimoine ! " The Count struggled furiously, but hope lessly. " It s no use. You may as well give in, Stumps ! " As Brown uttered this name the Count suddenly became limp. The little bundle that he had clutched tightly through the struggle dropped from his nerveless hand, and fell open as it struck the ground. And there, gleaming in the moonlight, a brace of razors, a stubby brush, a stout pair of shears, lay loosely in the folds of a barber s jacket ! And this was the sorry climax to the bril- JAUNE D ANTIMOINE. 1 03 liant romance of the proscribed Bonapartist, the Count Siccatif de Courtray ! Jaune, who was a generous-hearted young fellow, was for setting free his crest-fallen rival at once, and so having done with him. Brown took a more statesmanlike view of the situation. " We will let him go after he has owned up to Madame Carthame what a fraud he is," he said. The Count winced when this sentence was pronounced, but he uttered no remonstrance. The shock of the discovery had completely demoralized him. It was after midnight when they reached Madame Carthame s dwelling, and Rose her self, with her hair done up in curl papers, opened the door for them. When she recog nized the three visitors and perceived that the Count was in custody, and at the same moment remembered her curl papers, on her face the gaze of astonishment and the blush of maidenly modesty contended for the right of way. Madame Carthame fairly was in bed as IO4 COLOR STUDIES. was evident from the spirited conversation between herself and her vivacious daughter, that was perfectly audible through the fold ing doors which separated the little parlor from her bedroom. It was evident, also, that she was indisposed to rise. However, her indisposition was overcome, and in the course of twenty minutes or so she appeared arrayed in a frigid dignity and a loose wrap per. Rose, meanwhile, had taken off her curl papers, and Jaune regarded her tumbled hair with ecstasy. The tribunal being assembled, the prisoner was placed at the bar and the trial began. It was an eminently irregular trial, looking at it from a legal point of view, for the verbal evidence all was hearsay. But it also was extra legal in that it was brief and decisive. Brown gave his testimony in the shape of a repetition of the story that Jaune had told him had been told by Mr. Badger Brush s groom ; and when this was concluded, Jaune produced the jacket, razors, shears, and shaving brush, and stated the circumstances JAUNE D^ANTIMOINE. 10$ under which they had been found. Then the prosecution rested. Being questioned by the court that is to say, by Madame Carthame in his own de fence, the Count replied gloomily that he hadn t any. When I saw that horse fel low," he said, "I knew that I was likely to get into trouble, and that was the reason why I wanted to get rid of these things. And now the game is up. It is all true. I was a barber. I am not a count. My real name is Stumps." Then it was that Madame Carthame, bliss fully ignorant of the fact that she had neg lected to remove her night-cap, stood up in her place, with her wrapper gathered about her in a statuesque fashion, and in a tragic tone uttered the single word : "Sortez!" And the Count went ! Out, out into the chill and gloom of night went the false Count, never to return ; and with him went Madame Carthame s fond hope that her daughter would be a countess, 106 COLOR STUDIES. which also was the last barrier in the way of Jaune d Antimoine s love. Perceiving that the force of fate inexorably was pressing upon her, Madame Carthame still in her night-cap bestowed upon Rose and Jaune the maternal blessing in a manner that, even allowing for the night-cap, was both stately and severe. As at Vandyke Brown s wedding Jaune d Antimoine was radiantly magnificent in " The Marquis Suit," adding splendor to the ceremony and rendering himself most pleas ing in the eyes of Rose Carthame ; so a month later, he was yet more radiant when he wore the famous suit again, in the church of Saint Vincent de Paul, and was himself married. Conte" Crayon brought Mr. Badger Brush down to the wedding, and the groom came too, and the tailor got wind of it and came without being asked and had to be implored not to work it up into an advertisement, as he very much wanted to do. Mrs. Vandyke JAUNE D^ANTIMOINE. IO/ Brown, just home from her wedding journey, was the first after the kiss of Madame Carthame had been sternly bestowed to kiss the bride ; and Mr. Badger Brush irrever ently whispered to Conte Crayon that he wished, by gad ! he had her chance ! ORPIMENT & GAMBOGE. THE firm was in leather, down in the Swamp, and Mr. Orpiment used to ride down-town every morning from his house in Bank Street, regular as the almanac, in a Bleecker Street car. His house was one of those eminently respectable, high-stooped dwellings, between Fourth Street and the old Greenwich Road quite the court end of what used to be Greenwich village three score years or so ago, and about as pleasant an abiding-place as you will find to-day in all the city of New York. This house was un necessarily large for Mr. Orpiment s family for the whole of his family was himself; but as he seemed to be entirely satisfied with it, no one ventured to suggest to him that he had better move. Indeed, there were few people in the world who, knowing Mr. Orpi- ORPIMENT &> GAMBOGE. ment, would have willingly ventured to sug gest to him anything whatever, for he was not a person who took suggestions kindly. In point of fact, he usually took them with a snap. When young Orpiment, in a suggestive sort of way, observed modestly from under his blonde mustache that his uncle would be doing a good thing if he would rescind the edict under which he, young Orpiment, was going through the form of learning the leather business, and would permit him to betake himself to the study of Art when young Orpiment made this suggestion, I say, Mr. Orpiment fell into such a rage that his counting-house large though it was and small though he was would not hold him ; in his wrath he strode out into his ware house, among the kips and hides, and used language in their presence strong enough to tan them. The upshot of the matter was, that young Orpiment was given twenty-four hours in which to make up his mind whether he would stick to leather and his bread and IIO COLOR STUDIES. butter, or be an infernal idiot (such was Mr. Orpiment s unparliamentary language) and starve among his paint-pots. And young Orpiment, his crisp blonde hair fairly brist ling with determination, every muscle in his large, well-built body tense with energy, in something less than twenty-four seconds elected for starvation and the pots of paint. But for all his high temper and defiant way of dealing with things, there was one thing that Mr. Orpiment could not deal with defiantly. One morning only a few weeks after this battle royal of the paint-pots had been fought to the astonishment of all the people in Bank Street, his front door did not open at precisely twenty-seven minutes after eight o clock ; and the conductor of the Bleecker Street car concluded that in some mysterious way he must have got ahead of his schedule, because at 8.30 Mr. Orpiment was not standing, like a block-signal, with his neatly-folded umbrella thrust out straight before him, at the Bank Street crossing ; and Mr. Gamboge got into a nervous fluster, OR PI ME N T & GAMBOGE. Ill and said that he knew that something must be wrong, when the counting-house clock struck nine and Mr. Orpiment did not make his appearance, as was his invariable custom, between the sixth stroke and the seventh. And something was wrong : Mr. Orpiment was dead. As all through his life Mr. Orpiment had been setting himself to go off, like an alarm clock, at definitely determined points in the future, so did he carry this habit into the testamentary disposition of his estate. His will, so to speak, was double-barrelled. The first barrel went off immediately upon his decease, and, as it were, set the alarm. After devising certain small legacies to a few friends and dependants, to be paid out of accruing income, and a round ten thousand dollars in Government bonds to the Protes tant Home for Half-Orphans an institution in which, for many years, Mr. Orpiment had taken the liveliest interest, probably be cause in his early life he had been a half- orphan himself, and knew how very disa- 112 COLOR STUDIES. greeable it was ; after these rational and commendable bequests, the will took a new departure, and the rest of it was as eccentric and as arbitrary as ever Mr. Orpiment him self had been : and that is saying a good deal. It declared that all the rest, residue, and remainder of Mr. Orpiment s estate, real and personal, whatsoever and wheresoever, was given, devised, and bequeathed unto his ex ecutors Mr. Gamboge and Mr. Mangan Brown were the executors in trust : to col lect and receive the income thereof, and to pay thereout all necessary charges and ex penses, and to invest the surplus income each year, and to add the same to the principal of Mr. Orpiment s estate, and thus to reinvest and accumulate for the period of five years after Mr. Orpiment s decease ; and at the expiration of the said period, to hold the said principal, with its additions and accu mulations, upon the further trusts set out in a codicil to this Mr. Orpiment s will, which codicil would be found in the top drawer of the small fire-proof safe in Mr. Orpiment s ORPIMENT & GAMBOGE. 1 13 library ; and (here was the queerest part of all) that until the expiration of the said five years this codicil was not to be opened under any circumstances whatsoever. The will further provided that until the five years should be ended Mr. Gamboge should carry on the business of the firm under the firm name ; and, in an extremely peremptory clause, he was forbidden to give employ ment, in any shape or way, to young Orpi- ment. The leather business and the art business, the will stated dryly, were inharmo nious ; and inasmuch as young Orpiment had chosen the latter, the testator wished to leave him entirely free to carry it on undis turbed by the claims of the former upon his thought and time. With this parting shot the will ended, as a sailor would say, short without giving, save as such was to be found in the tidy legacy to the Protestant half-orphans, the least hint or suggestion as to what was to become of Mr. Orpiment s fortune at the end of the five years ; without throwing the faintest 8 114 COLOR STUDIES. ray of light upon the mystery that all this waiting and trust-creating involved. It was as queer a will as ever went to probate ; in deed, had there been anybody besides young Orpiment to contest it, the probabilities are that it would not have been admitted to probate at all. But young Orpiment was Mr. Orpiment s sole kinsman ; and, as matters stood just then, his pride was so thoroughly up that had he been called upon to choose between breaking the will and breaking his own neck, he would have chosen the latter alternative with all possible celerity. And so, although he was dead and buried, Mr. Orpiment had arranged matters in such a fashion that for these five years at least it by no means could be said with any sort of truthfulness that he had perished from off the earth. ABOUT this time there was not a happier family in all Greenwich, nor anywhere else, for that matter, than the Browns. Mr. Man- gan Brown, in the large-hearted way that be- ORPIMENT & GAMBOGE. 11$ came his big body and big voice, and acting, of course, with the warm approval of Miss Caledonia, had urged Vandyke and Rose so heartily to bring the baby and come and live with them, that a refusal really was quite out of the question. So it came to pass that Mr. Mangan Brown, without the perceptible quiv er of so much as an eyelash, signed a check big enough to pay for one of those delight ful houses, with gardens in front of them, and broad verandas all the way up to their third stories, in West Eleventh Street which also is a part of Greenwich village, as may be mentioned for the information of the mass of New Yorkers who know nothing of New York. And in this pretty home, one bright May day, when the trees and gardens were glad in their fresh loveliness of delicious green, they all harmoniously took up their abode. Mr. Mangan Brown had the second-story front, and Miss Caledonia and Verona had the two second-story backs, and the third floor was given over to the baby and Van- Il6 COLOR STUDIES. dyke and Rose. If anything could make brighter the bright spring-time, it was the sight of Rose and the baby on the veranda in the early morning sunlight Rose, prettier than ever, laughing delightedly at the baby s earnest efforts to reach out over the row of flower-pots and clutch the swaying branches of the trees. Before going to his big studio on Fourteenth Street, to begin the work of the day, Van liked to smoke his after-break fast pipe on the veranda and contemplate this pretty picture. In the two years which had slipped away since his marriage a good deal more than he ever had dared even to hope for had come to pass. Thanks to his own pluck and hard work, which had won for him Uncle Man- gan s substantial backing, he now was as suc cessful an artist as there was to be found in all New York. At times, in contemplation of his good fortune, he was rather more than half inclined to think that he must be some body else ; an excess of mysticism that Rose resolutely refused to countenance for in ORPIMENT & GAMBOGE. II 7 such a case to whom was she married ? she pertinently asked. As for Mr. Mangan Brown, from being rather a grumpy sort of an old fellow, he had come to be positively beaming a sort of overgrown fairy god father, as it were, to the whole household. Not even the most remote allusion did he now make to the commercial rather than natural genesis of Miss Caledonia s back hair : and by this sign Miss Caledonia knew that he had experienced a change of heart. Moreover, he was instant in good works to each of the several members of the family ; indeed, the extraordinary gifts which he constantly brought home to little Madder (named for his grandfather, of course) kept Rose constantly in a condition between laughter and tears. " What can Madder possibly do with a grindstone, Uncle Mangan ? " "Possibly nothing at present, my dear. But I remember when I was a boy and lived in the country, I wanted a grindstone more than anything else in the world especially Il8 COLOR STUDIES. after old Mitre Rabbit, the wheelwright, you know, said that I couldn t use his ; and I am sure that Madder will be glad enough, when he is a little older, to have one of his own. It can go in the cellar until he wants it, and in the mean time it will be useful to sharpen the carving knife." Rose shuddered as her imagination con jured up a ghastly picture of Madder more or less cut to pieces with the knives which the grindstone had made cruelly sharp ; and she registered a mental vow that only over her dead body should her offspring ever come into possession of this shocking gift. Now two of the most constant of the rather numerous visitors to this exceptionally happy household were young Orpiment and Mr. Gamboge. All the way along for the past twenty years or so, Mr. Gamboge had been in the habit of spending one or two evenings in each and every week in company with Mr. Mangan Brown his friend and also his associate in trade. Mr. Gamboge and Mr. Mangan Brown had known each other ever ORPIMENT & GAMBOGE. IIQ since they were boys ; and M. Brown & Co., and Orpiment & Gamboge owned in partner ship a tannery in Lycoming County, Penn sylvania, and in various other directions the interests of the two firms were identical. Ostensibly, the visits of Mr. Gamboge were for the purpose of quietly and comfortably talking over the affairs of the tannery ; but it was an open secret in part revealed by the exceptionally careful brushing bestowed upon his fuzzy, close-cropped, grayish hair, by the exceeding smoothness of his smooth- shaven, fresh-colored face, by the admirable precision of the cut and fit of his neat black clothes that their real object was Miss Cale donia. And there was a pleasant twinkle in his kindly gray eyes when they happened to meet as they very often did Miss Caledo nia s kindly brown ones, that made this open secret more open still. In point of fact, for nearly the full term of the twenty years during which Mr. Gamboge had been making his weekly visits, he had held toward Miss Caledonia the somewhat I2O COLOR STUDIES. trying position of an earnest but undeclared lover. His earnestness could not for a mo ment be doubted ; but although Miss Cale donia in a strictly proper and maidenly manner, be it understood had contrived that he should have at least one opportunity in each week during the past twenty years for making to her a formal tender of the heart that she well knew without such tender was hers, it was a melancholy fact that each of these ten hundred and forty opportunities successively had been wasted. " Did he say anything to-night, Cale donia ? " "No, brother, not to-night. I think I think that next week " " Um. Possibly. Good-night, Caledo nia." " Good-night, brother." This conversation between Mr. Mangan Brown and Miss Caledonia had come to be stereotyped. Before Mr. Mangan experi enced his change of heart this was the occa sion that he usually took for referring to the ORPIMENT & GAMBOGE. 121 commercial characteristics of her back hair in terms as pointed as they were unkind. And not seldom would he go even further, and advise that Miss Caledonia should in vestigate into the requirements precedent to admission into Saint Luke s Home for Aged Couples, on Hudson Street assuring her that if ever she and Mr. Gamboge got so far along as to want a home for couples of any sort, this certainly would be the only home at all suited to their needs. Many and many a night, her night-cap being drawn well down over the thinly-thatched region that was. covered luxuriantly by the hair of commerce by day, did Miss Caledonia fall asleep with tears in her gentle brown eyes and heaviness in her heart. But, being a round little woman of sanguine temperament, she managed on the whole to keep up her courage pretty well. Each week, when Mr. Gamboge meaningly pressed her plump little hand as he bade her good-night, yet left still unsaid what he had come expressly to say, she believed that the next week would see 122 COLOR STUDIES. his moral strength established firmly at last ; that then the words would be spoken which he so earnestly longed to utter, and which she so earnestly longed to hear. And so believing, Miss Caledonia lived on always in hope. Now the trouble with Mr. Gamboge that made him keep silence in this provoking fashion was a constitutional indecision that he could in nowise overcome. Never did there live a man with less of positiveness in his nature than Mr. Gamboge had in his. This was the reason why he and Mr. Orpi- ment always had got along so well together. Mr. Orpiment, on the shortest notice, could be positive enough about anything for six ordinary people, and upon this superabun dance of resolution Mr. Gamboge was accus tomed to draw in order to make good his own lack. Indeed, he could not have adopted any other line of conduct without getting into difficulties, for Mr. Orpiment, as is the way with positive people the world over, could not tolerate even the most re- ORPIMENT & GAMBOGE. 123 mote approach to positiveness on the part of anybody else. He might admit, perhaps, though certainly disdainfully, that in the abstract two or more opinions might be entertained upon a given subject ; but the moment that the matter became concrete, his view narrowed into the unalterable con viction that there was just one single tenable opinion concerning it and that was his. And, if peace was to be preserved, that opinion had to be adopted in a hurry. Mr. Gamboge, whose love of peace was so great that it was the only thing in the world that he would have fought for, always adopted his partner s opinions with a becoming alac rity. Nor did he, while Mr. Orpiment s convictions were in course of formation, vent ure to have any of his own. If appealed to under such conditions, his answer invariably was: I am waiting to confer with Mr. Orpiment." And upon the rare occasions when, in some matter foreign to the affairs of the firm, he ventured so far as to express views distinctively his own, it had come to 124 COLOR STUDIES. be his habit to preface his remarks with some such phrase as " Under these condi tions, I think that Mr. Orpiment would say/ or, " In a case of this sort, I think that Mr. Orpiment would do." The fact was ob served, however, by people who knew both the members of the firm well, that what Mr. Gamboge thus said or did under the sup posititious shelter of Mr. Orpiment s mantle, usually had a deal more of quiet good sense about it than probably would have been manifested had the matter really been set tled by Mr. Orpiment himself. For some time after that morning when Mr. Orpiment stayed at home and died in his bed instead of coming down-town in the Bleecker Street car, the habit of referring to his late partner s opinions increased upon Mr. Gamboge greatly. Not a hide, not even a kip, did he buy or sell without having some thing to say to the seller or buyer as to what Mr. Orpiment would have thought about the terms upon which the transaction was con cluded. But again it was observed by cer- ORPIMENT & GAMBOGE. 12$ tain long-headed leather-men down in the Swamp, that since the decease of the senior partner the firm of Orpiment & Gamboge was doing a much larger and also a much safer business than ever it had done while the very positive Mr. Orpiment was alive. However, the habit of a life-time cannot be given over in a day. It is true that Mr. Gamboge, now that Mr. Orpiment was buried and done for, was beginning gradu ally to have a few opinions and a trifling amount of positiveness of his own ; but as yet it was all too soon to expect him to pos sess, still less to act upon, a positive opinion touching this momentous matter of his own heart and Miss Caledonia s hand. As to the other visitor at the Brown s, young Orpiment, matters were entirely dif ferent. With an energetic promptness that was strictly in keeping with the traditions of his family, he had declared his love for Verona under the most unfavorable circum stances and in the most unmistakable terms. With a disregard of prudence and reason 126 COLOR STUDIES. that was positively heroic, he had made this avowal on the very day that his uncle had bidden him begone to his paint-pots and starve. Whether he thought that love, be ing had in sufficient quantities, would make starvation impossible, or that if he must starve it would be pleasanter to do it in lov ing company, I am not prepared to say ; but it is a fact that in less than three hours after he had, as he put it, disinherited his uncle, he had asked Verona Brown to marry him and Verona Brown, collapsing from the pinnacle of dignity upon which usually she was exalted, suffered her beautiful dark hair to be shockingly tumbled upon young Orpiment s shoulder, and, with infinite ten derness and infinite love in her sweet, low voice, told him very frankly that she would ! There was a suggestion, at least, of poetic justice in this reckless entanglement of Verona s affections by young Orpiment ; for it was Vandyke Brown who had been very largely the cause of the entanglement of young Orpiment s affections by the goddess ORPIMENT &* GAMBOGE. I2/ Art, to the utter ruin of his exceptionally brilliant prospects in the leather business. Young Orpiment had artistic talent, possibly artistic genius, and Brown had the wit to perceive it. Without thinking of the harm that he might be doing, he urged young Orpiment to abandon the leather that he hated and to give himself to the art that he loved ; and it was not until his advice was taken, and he was called upon to behold the pretty kettle of fish that had come of it, that he perceived what a serious responsibility the giving of advice involves. With his own dreary experience still fresh in mind, he realized far more clearly than young Orpi ment did, or could, how nearly hopeless is the struggle for artistic success when the artist has to earn his daily bread as he goes along. But he kept these cheerful reflec tions to himself that is to say, to himself and Rose. They were quite agreed that young Orpiment and Verona had a suffi ciency of troubles in hand without being called upon to take any upon interest. 128 COLOR STUDIES. To be sure, there was a ray of hope for a moment when Mr. Orpiment died, for young Orpiment was his legal and only heir. But this hope was promptly extinguished, or pretty nearly so, by Mr. Orpiment s extraor dinary double-barrelled will with that omi nous legacy in the first barrel to the Protes tant half-orphans. " It will be just like the old wretch to have left those miserable half-orphans every cent of his money, Van," said Rose with energetic determination. " And a nice thing that will be, to be sure ; turning all their heads by making so many millionaires of them ! " "The ome alf-orphan," observed Jaune d Antimoine, who happened to be present when Rose thus freed her mind. " Ah, e is the estabelisment most curious in Tens Street. I ave much vondered at im. Tell me, my Van, what is this ome alf-orphan ? " " It s a place where they take care of chil dren born with only one leg and one arm. Of course, children like that have to be taken ORPIMENT <5r> GAMBOGE. care of by somebody. It s a capital charity. We ll go down there some day and see em. They re a jolly queer lot ; all go about hop ping, you know." " Nonsense, Van. Don t believe him, M. d Antimoine. They are called half-orphans because they have only one father or one mother. I m a half-orphan myself." " Eh ? But, truly, Madame Brown, it is not most common for the child to ave more than one father or one mother not, that is, is it thought well that e should ave more. Ah, pardon! I forget that Madame says that she is erself alf-orphan. No doubt to be so is most well in this country. In America is not as in France." M. d Antimoine no more comprehended why Brown went off into such fits of laughter, nor why Rose blushed a little and laughed too, than he did the laborious explanation of the constituent elements of a half-orphan that Brown, under the circumstances, felt called upon to make to him. But whether Mr. Orpiment s money was 9 130 COLOR STUDIES. or was not destined for the use of this excel lent charity, there was no ground for hoping that any part of it was destined for his nephew ; the spiteful clause in the will for bidding Mr. Gamboge to give employment to young Orpiment cut hope in this direction short off. Obviously, this clause was put in to serve as a check upon any indiscretion that Mr. Gamboge might be led into by what Mr. Orpiment always had styled his absurdly soft heart ; and it was a patent declaration of a tolerably positive sort that young Orpiment was disinherited. His sole fortune, under these circumstances, was a little property that had come down to him from his father, and that yielded him the magnificent income of four hundred and seventy-one dollars a year. However, this was enough to keep a roof over his head, and to feed him and to give him at very long intervals something in the way of new clothes. Mr. Gamboge, by artfully repre senting the solitariness of his own home, did his best to make young Orpiment come and ORPIMENT &> GAMBOGE. 131 share it with him ; but his uncommonly tall stories about his melancholy loneliness stories, let us hope, which were promptly blotted out in the celestial account against him by the friendly tears of the recording angel did not deceive his auditor. Grate fully, but decidedly, the tender thus made of exceedingly comfortable free quarters was declined. But the invitations to dinner that Mr. Gamboge and the Browns showered upon him could not be refused at least not without giving pain ; and so, while his rai ment was anything but purple and fine linen, young Orpiment at least fared sumptuous ly pretty nearly every day. And he was cheered and comforted, as only the love of a good woman can cheer and comfort a man, by the love of Verona Brown. Verona certainly manifested a most con spicuous lack of worldly wisdom in thus lavishing her affections upon a man whose fortunes were so near to being desperate. But then excepting in the case of Mr. Mangan worldly wisdom was not a promi- I3 2 COLOR STUDIES. nent characteristic of the Brown family ; and even Mr. Mangan had less of it now than he had before he experienced his change of heart. Only a couple of years earlier in his life, acting in the capacity of Verona s guar dian, he would have shown young Orpi- ment to the door with amazing promptitude and energy, had he ventured to present him self, under such circumstances as at present existed, in the guise of Verona s suitor. And, in truth, he had no great liking for what was going on now ; but now, at least, he took a larger, a more liberal view of life than had been his habit in the past for the lesson that he had learned from his relations with Van had made him more tolerant. Therefore it was that, instead of heaping maledictions upon young Orpiment s head, he ordered a landscape from him. In due time this order was filled, and the picture was sent home. There was ever so much of it, and its light and shade were ever so queer, and there was something dreadfully wrong in its perspective ; but, for all its ORPIMENT & GAMBOGE. 133 eccentricities, there were in it hints of genu ine good quality. It was a harrowing thing of look at, of course ; but its badness was the badness of a crudity in which there was hope. So they had young Orpiment to dinner, and after dinner the picture was hung solemnly over the mantel-piece in the front parlor. This was an honorable position for it to occupy, and it was a position that pos- jessed certain practical advantages ; for when the gas was lighted, unless you climbed over one of the diagonally placed sofas and got quite into one of the corners of the room, the picture had such a glitter upon it that it simply was invisible. Old Madder, who also was dining with them that night, began to comment upon this fact and only made matters worse by asking Rose, in an ag grieved tone, what he was saying that he shouldn t say to make her pinch him so. Of course this was not a genuine sale, looking at the matter from an artist s stand point ; and certain other sales to Mr. Gam- 134 COLOR STUDIES. boge and to some of the friends of these two purchasers were not genuine either ; but they served their well-meant purpose of keeping the fire going under the pot that young Orpiment so gallantly was striving to make boil. Old Madder, by the way, much enjoyed dining with the young people, and they and Mr. Mangan and Miss Caledonia made him very welcome. At these dinners he con ducted himself upon the lines of a serious dignity, and seriously talked art to Mr. Mangan, whose knowledge of art was lim ited to a commercial appreciation of the value of gilt decorations on red leather boot- tops designed for the Western trade ; or, when he happened to be in a cantankerous mood, made vicious thrusts at Van and the young geniuses generally, under the guise of lamentations over the degeneracy of modern painters. His own work, of course, continued to be as exasperating as ever. He nearly drove Van wild by insisting upon painting a portrait of little Madder, that was ORPIMENT & GAMBOGE. 135 hung on the line at the Academy, and that was described in the catalogue as " Grand father s Darling." From the degenerate modern painters with whom he associated, Van did not hear the last of that horrible caricature of his first-born for years. Among the League men the picture was styled The Slaughter of the Innocent" which naturally enough led somebody to speak of the artist as Herod, and so won for old Madder the nickname of Herod Madder that he bore, without knowing it, to the end of his days. After this bitter experience, when old Madder wanted to paint Rose and the new baby, little Caledonia (to all intents and purposes his " Soldier s Widow and Orphaned Child" over again), and call it "The Young Mother s First Love," Brown put his foot down firmly and said that it should not be done. And not until several months had passed in the course of which old Madder gradually had convinced himself that Brown was jealous of his superior work, and that, under these circumstances, he could afford to 136 COLOR STUDIES. be magnanimous did old Madder and Brown get along well together again. By the time that this second baby was born, Brown had conquered so firm a stand ing-place, and was so crowded with work that his acceptance of an order had come to be considered something of a favor. Young Orpiment, being present one day when an order actually was rejected, and knowing that Brown had fought and won just such a battle as he was fighting, felt himself stirred with hope. And, in truth, as the season of his appren ticeship wore away, there came to be a good deal for young Orpiment to feel hopeful about. Working steadily and earnestly, the weeks and the months slipped by until he found behind him, since the day when he forswore Leather as a master and took for his mistress Art, three whole years ; and three years of honest hard work, if a man has got anything in him to begin with, is bound to tell. His little pictures after those first orders he had the sense not to ORPIMENT & GAMBOGE. 137 paint big ones had a fair sale now on their merits. They did not sell for much, it is true, and they still were a long way off from being really good work ; but at least the good quality that was in them no longer was obscured by bad perspective and by doubt ful light and shade. They had a clear, fresh tone, moreover, that was distinctively their own. Being sent to the exhibitions, they no longer were rejected ; and some of the more recent ones had taken a most encour aging step downward from the sky toward the line. The newspapers began to men tion his work respectfully, and The Skeptic, with an amiable exercise of its powers of prophecy based upon its faculty for recog nizing genius in embryo, even went so far as to say that in him another landscape painter had been born. All this was tremendously encouraging, of course, and young Orpiment was heartened and comforted by it greatly ; but even with such good fortune attending him, he could not but find weariness in his long time of 138 COLOR STUDIES. waiting for an income from his work that would enable him to make Verona his wife. Both Mr. Mangan Brown and Mr. Gamboge had offered repeatedly to discount for him the future that now pretty certainly was his ; but this good offer, with Verona s entire ap proval, he decidedly refused. If Verona would wait for him while he worked, he said and the light of a strong resolution shone in his blue eyes he would work on until his success was won. And Verona, with the gentle dignity that was natural to her, drew up her tall, graceful figure to its full height, and answered simply that she would wait would wait, she said, and without the least intention of irony, for forty years. For these expectant lovers, the example set them by Miss Caledonia and Mr. Gam boge was most encouraging. What was their three years of probation in comparison with the three-and-twenty years of probation that their elders had endured? And the encouragement thus given was all the greater because, as time went on, the matri- ORPIMENT & GAMBOGE. 139 monial prospects of Mr. Gamboge and Miss Caledonia apparently stood still. In the past three years Miss Caledonia had con trived near eight-score fresh opportunities for the long-delayed proposal ; and on each of these several occasions Mr. Gamboge had hesitated until his opportunity was lost. On the whole, however, Miss Caledonia s san guine nature found cause for encouragement in the perceptible change that had come over Mr. Gamboge as these three years sped by. No less than twice, to her certain knowledge, had he expressed positively a positive opin ion of his own. On a memorable Saturday he had said, in a firm voice, before the whole family assembled at the dinner-table, that rare roast beef was much improved by horse radish. On a memorable Thursday evening he had said, addressing Mr. Mangan Brown, and in a tone of bold effrontery that thrilled her soul with joy, that " this idiotic tinkering at the tariff on foreign leather was simply unpardonable." On neither of these occa sions did Mr. Gamboge refer even remotely COLOR STUDIES. to Mr. Orpiment : not a word about Mr. Orpiment s preferences in the matter of applying horse-radish to roast beef; not a word about Mr. Orpiment s opinions in re gard to the customs duties on foreign hides. Here was living proof that Mr. Gamboge was getting to have a mind of his own ; and here, consequently, was substantial ground upon which Miss Caledonia could found her conviction that a happy ending to her long courting was near at hand. Nor was this all. To the best of Miss Caledonia s belief, Mr. Gamboge actually once had got so far as to make a real start toward speaking the momentous words which would resolve into a glad certainty their three-and-twenty years of doubt. It was upon a pleasant Sunday afternoon in the late spring-time that Mr. Gamboge got started in the mellow weather when the buds of May were bursting into the blossoms of June, and all nature was glad with the bright promise of the coming summer s generous life. They two were seated alone upon the veranda, ORPIMENT &> GAMBOGE. 141 screened from the too-curious gaze of pass ers-by by festoons of the climbing plants which had shot up blithely since the warm days began ; and Mr. Gamboge, in a state of post-prandial contentment, was smoking an especially satisfactory cigar. After the fashion of a dove-like serpent, Miss Cale donia by degrees had shifted the ground of their talk until it had come to be of the dreary life that Mr. Gamboge was leading in his great house wherein he dwelt alone. There was a tender solicitude in Miss Cale donia s tone that sunk deep into the heart of Mr. Gamboge and wrought great havoc there. Her low, gentle voice sounded sweetly in his ears ; her suggestions for his comfort were practical without being revolu tionary ; he felt but more keenly than ever before in all the twenty-three years that in Miss Caledonia he would find a helpmate indeed. His excellent dinner prepared, as he well knew, under Miss Caledonia s super vision his excellent cigar, the soft spring weather, Miss Caledonia s pleasingly plump 142 COLOR STUDIES. person and sympathetic words : all these agreeable forces, acting upon his newly ac quired disposition to have a mind of his own and speak it, conspired to make him utter the decisive words. A nervous thrill went over him, and he straightened himself in his chair. Miss Caledonia saw what was com ing, and was struck with awe. She ceased speaking ; her hands fluttered with her hand kerchief; there was a trembling of her lips. " In regard to our personal relations, Miss Caledonia, I am sure that Mr. Orpiment would have said that is, I know that under these conditions Mr. Orpiment would have done in fact, I am confident that Mr. Orpi ment would have approved " " Oh, confound old Orpiment," said that wretched Vandyke Brown, stepping out upon the veranda through the open window in time to hear this last mention of Mr. Orpi- ment s name. " Of course you know, Mr. Gamboge," he went on, " I don t want to hurt your feelings, or anything " for he saw that Mr. Gamboge was very much upset ORPIMENT & GAMBOGE. 143 " But when I think what a lot of good that old screw might have done by leaving his money to his nephew, and so giving him a fair start in the world, I really can t help hating the very sound of his name. " Aunt Caledonia ? Rose wants to know if you can tell what on earth has gone with Madder s light cloak. You had him out yes terday, you know, and Rose can t find it anywhere." "You will find it where it belongs," an swered Miss Caledonia frigidly, " on the third shelf of the closet in the back room." And so good fortune had come sailing down over the sea of hope to Miss Caledonia even had stopped to signal her and then had sailed away ! After that rude interrup tion the perturbed spirit of Mr. Gamboge although Miss Caledonia did her best to bring it could not be brought back to the tender mood that so fairly had promised a fair solution of the long-vexed problem of their lives. Still, having come thus close to happiness, Miss Caledonia felt more than 144 COLOR STUDIES. ever certain that happiness yet would be hers. So the months went rolling on and on, and the time drew near when Mr. Orpiment s five years lease upon posterity would end. Under the judicious management of Mr. Gamboge, his late partner s estate had in creased prodigiously, and the prospects of the Protestant half-orphans were amazingly fine. "I don t doubt that the miserable little creatures will get fifty thousand dollars apiece and I hope that it will choke them ! " said Rose in a fine burst of indignation and in a fine mixture of metaphors. Nothing that Van could say could convince Rose that Mr. Orpiment s property would not be di vided up among the individual half-orphans in the asylum at the time when the bequest became operative. As to young Orpiment, he really did not care very much now whether the half-orphans got his uncle s money or not. He was fairly ORPIMENT & GAMBOGE. 145 on his legs by this time, with a steady income of two thousand dollars or so a year, and he and Verona were to be married very soon. Of course, they would have to live in a very quiet way, and some of the things which they most wanted to do the trip to the glorious mountain region of Northern New Mexico, for instance would have to wait awhile. But the great point was that at last he was earning enough by his own work to permit him, without utterly defying Mr. Mangan Brown and worldly wisdom, to make Verona his wife. For young Orpiment had fought bravely and had won gallantly his battle for the standard of Art. And wasn t Verona proud of him, though ! For Verona knew that his fight for success as an artist was only the visible form of his fight for success as a lover ; and all the wealth of her strong love, all her honoring esteem, went, out to this her hero, who, for her love s sake, had con quered the world ! With the solemnity befitting so decisive 10 146 COLOR STUDIES. an occasion, Mr. Gamboge wrote a formal invitation to young Orpiment to be present, on the fifth anniversary of the day after the day of Mr. Orpiment s death, at the going off of the second barrel of Mr. Orpiment s will. But, in order to mitigate the formality a little, and to make somewhat less solemn the solemnity, Mr. Gamboge himself handed the written invitation to young Orpiment, and added to it a verbal invitation to come and dine with him as a preliminary to the reading. Under the circumstances, the fact was obvious that Verona had a constructive right to be present when the will was read ; and as Verona could not with propriety be present alone, the necessity presented itself of asking Miss Caledonia to come with her. Naturally, this suggested the advisability of asking Mr. Mangan Brown too. And hav ing got this far, Mr. Gamboge concluded that he might just as well go a little farther and ask Van and Rose and old Madder ; and so he did. It was only a lucky accident, however, ORPIMEXT &> GAMBOGE. 147 that saved the party from being entirely broken up by a rash act of little Caledonia s. Van wanted Rose s hands for something that he was painting, and she had gone up to the studio the day before the will dinner-party as she styled the feast that Mr. Gamboge was to give taking the baby along with her. There was not much of this baby, and she was not quite two years old, but she had a faculty for getting into pickles far beyond her size and years. However, there did not seem to be much chance for her to get into trouble on the studio floor. The fact must be confessed that, although they had been married for five years, Rose and Van had a shocking habit of philander ing ; and so it fell out, when he had put in her hands to his satisfaction, that he had laid down his palette and brushes on the foot of his easel, and somehow they had drifted into the big chair, and had got to talking about that autumn morning when"Lydia Darragh " perished, and the great happiness of their lives began. 14 COLOR STUDIES. " It was dreadful, Van, the way that I told you, right out before all those men, that I loved you ! I never can think of it without blushing." (Rose was blushing most charm ingly, and that was a fact.) " But I really never thought of them at all, and that s the solemn truth. All that I thought of was your ruined work, and of what you were working for it was me that you were work ing for, you know, and I knew all about it ! and of trying to comfort you. Did it comfort you, dear ? Are you sure, Van, that you are glad that you married me ? Have I really made you happy? You are so good to me Caledonia! Caledonia! STOP! Merci ful heaven, Van, she s got your palette and is eating the paints ! Our child is poisoned ! She will die ! " And Rose shot up, much as she would have done had Van been a cata pult and suddenly gone off, and caught the chromnivorous infant in her arms. Van was pretty badly scared too, but he had his wits about him, and looked at the ORPJMEWT & GAMBOGE. 149 palette before giving his assent to Rose s alarmed proposition that death by poison must be the inevitable result of Caledonia s unnatural repast. "Steady, Rose. I guess it s all right. She s begun at the black end of the palette, luckily, and she s eaten only as far as asphal- tum. No doubt she ll have a lively time in her little inside, but she hasn t had a scrap of the light colors, and there s nothing in the dark ones to damage her much. But we d better rush her off to the doctor, all the same." And Van was right. Caledonia did not perish, but she had a tremendously large stomach-ache for so small a stomach, and she kept her bed for the remainder of the day. Mr. Mangan Brown, in a well-meant en deavor to mitigate the severity of her suf ferings, the very next morning bought her a concertina, and a pair of skates, and a richly illustrated octavo Life of Washington. That these appropriate gifts inured to her better ment is problematical, but she certainly was COLOR STUDIES. so completely recovered by the ensuing evening that her illness was no barrier to the success of the will dinner-party given by Mr. Gamboge. The dinner in every way was admirable although Miss Caledonia secretly noticed certain shortcomings in the service, which she promptly resolved should be corrected when she was called upon to take command. But for all the excellence of the dinner, the assembled company was disposed to slight it to hurry through with it in order to get at the reading of the will. Even the fact that young Orpiment on that very day had sold his big picture, " Spring on the Hud son Highlands," for $450 the highest price that anything of his so far had brought scarcely made a ripple upon the strong, stream of curiosity that was sweeping for ward toward the moment when positive knowledge would determine what part the Protestant half-orphans were to play in the final disposition of Mr. Orpiment s estate. " If it wasn t for Verona, he might pick ORPIAJENT & GAMBOGE. I$I out the nicest looking of the girl half- orphans for a wife, and get part of it back that way," said Rose under her breath to Van, as they passed from the dining-room to the library, where Mr. Gamboge was to read the will. " But as things are, though," she added with a touch of melancholy in her tone, " that is quite out of the question." " Yes," said Van, " it is. And you are a goose." And he stopped her in the shadow to leeward of the eight-day clock and kissed her. " Of course you all know," said Mr. Gam boge in a slightly oratorical tone, holding the sealed will in his hand, " that I have no knowledge whatever of the contents of this document. Should its contents be what I fear they are, you all know that I shall feel, as you all will feel, that a great injustice has been done to our young and gifted friend ; to our friend, who by his noble force of character, not less than by his great genius " "Don t," said young Orpiment, appeal- ingly. 152 COLOR STUDIES. " Well, I won t," said Mr. Gamboge, drop ping suddenly from his oratorical heights. " But I will say this : if the estate don t come to you, my dear boy, I shall think less of Mr. Orpiment s judgment then I ever did and I never did think much of it, anyway." At these spirited words Miss Caledonia s heart gave a bound for she perceived that now, beyond a doubt or a peradventure, Mr. Gamboge had come into the kingdom of his personal independence at last : and she was his waiting queen ! As for Mr. Mangan Brown, his lower jaw dropped as though the muscles had parted ; and Van gave utterance to a prolonged whistle that Rose had the presence of mind to conceal by coughing violently. Oblivious to the sensation caused by his revolutionary declaration, Mr. Gamboge ad justed his spectacles, broke the three black seals, and began the reading of the will. It set out with the affirmation that Mr. Orpi- ment feared God and was in his right mind statements which caused Miss Caledonia OR PI ME NT & GAMBOGE. 153 to purse her lips together doubtingly and went on with a list of the testator s posses sions : the house in which he had lived, and some other houses ; his share in the tannery in Lycoming County, Pennsylvania ; some warehouses down-town ; some building lots on Seventy-ninth Street ; various stocks and bonds ; and his interest in the leather busi ness carried on by the firm of Orpiment & Gamboge. " I wonder how the half-orphans will settle about the houses and building lots ? " Rose whispered inquiringly as Mr. Gamboge paused at the end of the list. "Draw lots for em, probably," Van whis pered in reply. Mr. Gamboge read on : "Whereas, by my will to which this codicil is supplement, I gave all my residuary estate to my executors upon certain trusts, now I appoint the fur ther trusts referred to in said will as con tained in this codicil." At last Mr. Orpiment s intentions were to be made plain. Everybody bent forward, 154 COLOR STUDIES. listening eagerly, and Mr. Gamboge could not keep his voice from trembling : " At the end of the said period of five years from the time of my decease I direct my executors to assign, convey, and pay over the whole of my residuary estate with its increase and ac cumulations to the person who, when the same is payable, shall act as treasurer to the Society for the Relief of Half-Orphan and Destitute Children in the City of New York, to be applied to the charitable uses and pur poses of said society under its direction." Mr. Gamboge gave an audible groan, laid the will down on his knee, took off his spec tacles, which suddenly had grown misty, and with his silk handkerchief wiped them dry. "The unfeeling, unnatural, heartless old wretch ! " cried Rose. " Never mind, dear; you have conquered fortune for yourself, and I love you a thou sand times more for it," said Verona in a low voice, as she took young Orpiment s hand in both of hers. ORPIMENT & GAMBOGE. 155 " It is shameful ! " said Miss Caledonia. " It is just what I expected," said Mr. Mangan Brown; "but I m uncommonly sorry for you, all the same, Orpiment." " It s all my fault, for leading you off into painting ; I hope devoutly that you may live long enough to forgive me, old fellow," said Van, ruefully. " Nonsense, Van. You ve been the mak ing of me, and I never can be sufficiently thankful to you," young Orpiment answered in a cheery tone that had a thoroughly genu ine ring to it. " Art alone is worth living for, Mr. Orpi ment," said old Madder. " Because you have escaped the thralldom of riches, I con gratulate you with all my heart ! " 11 There s another page of the thing," said Mr. Gamboge dismally, and making as he spoke a suspicious dab at his eyes with his big handkerchief. " We may as well get done with it," and he turned the page and read on : " Provided, that at the end of said period 156 COLOR STUDIES. of five years from the time of my decease my nephew shall not have proved, by earning from the sale of his pictures an income of not less than $2,000 yearly; that in abandon ing the leather business and in adopting the business of picture-painting, he was right in the choice of his vocation and I was wrong. Should this very improbable contingency arise, then at the time aforesaid I direct my executors to assign, convey, and pay over to him, my said nephew, the whole of my re siduary estate with its increase and accumu lations, to him, his heirs, executors, adminis trators, and assigns forever." " God bless you, my dear boy !" fairly shouted Mr. Gamboge, dashing down the will and his spectacles and his handkerchief upon the floor, and rushing over to young Orpiment and hugging him. " God bless you, my dear boy, the estate really is yours after all ! " And everybody everybody, that is, but Verona and old Madder in the delight and excitement of the moment, followed Mr. ORPIMENT & GAMBOGE. 157 Gamboge s exhilarating example. Even the staid Mr. Mangan Brown, even the decorous Miss Caledonia, hugged young Orpiment as hard as ever they knew how. Verona just sat still and looked at him, and through the tears in her lovely brown eyes there shone the light of a great joy and the tenderness of a greater love. The thought that she also was a gainer by this revolution in young Orpiment s fortunes never once crossed her mind; all that she thought of was that his life of toil and struggle now was at an end ; that for her hard-working hero the chance to do good work restfully had come at last. (It was not until an hour or so later, when they were walking home together, that an other phase of the matter presented itself to Rose she was a great hand for seeing things in original lights. " Do you know, Van," she said in a very melancholy voice, " I can t help feeling dreadfully sorry for those poor little Protestant half-orphans ? To think of 158 COLOR STUDIES. their coming so near to being heirs and heiresses, and then not getting a single bit of their fortunes after all ! ") Old Madder, waiting until the storm had subsided a little, and standing, as it were, afar off, did what he could to throw a wet blanket over the general joy by saying mournfully : " I hope that this is for the best, Mr. Orpiment ; but I fear that it is for the worst. Art is a jealous mistress, and Wealth is her sworn foe. You have my sincere pity, sir ; for I sincerely believe that you are a ruined man ! " However, old Madder s wet blanket was not a success, for his genial gloom no more could stay the eruption of happiness that had begun than a real wet blanket could stay an eruption of Vesuvius. Indeed, no body paid the least attention to what he was saying, for just as he began his cheerful re marks Mr. Gamboge, looking rather nervous, but also looking very much resolved, rose to ORPIMENT <Sr GAMBOGE. 1 59 his feet with the air of a man who is about to make a speech. Somehow there was that in his manner that made all the blood in Miss Caledonia s body rush tumultuously to her heart. Her prophetic soul told her that it was coming now in very truth ! " My dear Brown," said Mr. Gamboge, addressing Mr. Mangan, "there is a matter very near to my heart, concerning which I long have desired to speak with you. Pos sibly you may have noticed that my atten tions to your sister, Miss Caledonia, for some time past have been rather marked ? " "I have observed the phenomenon to which you refer," answered Mr. Mangan, for Mr. Gamboge had spoken interrogatively, and had paused for a reply "I have ob served the phenomenon to which you refer, my dear Gamboge, pretty constantly for the past twenty-five years." " Precisely," said Mr. Gamboge, in a tone indicating that he felt encouraged. "You are right, my dear Brown, as you always 160 COLOR STUDIES. are. My reckoning of the number of years during which my attentions to Miss Caledo nia have been, as I say, rather marked cor responds with yours exactly. And it seems to me, my dear Brown, that this period has been of a sufficient extent to enable us that is, to enable Miss Caledonia and me to ac quire such ample knowledge of each other s tastes, habits, and moral characteristics as will justify us in deciding now whether or not we prudently may advance to a yet closer relationship." " Looking at the matter dispassionately, my dear Gamboge, I should say that it had." " My own sentiments, my dear Brown, I may say, are, and for some years past have been, unalterably established. I revere your sister, Miss Caledonia, as the best and wisest of women. Under the existing circum stances, Mrs. Brown and Miss Verona will pardon, I am sure, this expression of what, under any other circumstances, might be ORPIMENT , & GA MB OGE. 1 6 1 considered, if not a too exalted, at least a too exclusive, estimate of her virtues." " Certainly," said Rose. "Of course," said Verona. " Entertaining these unalterable senti ments, therefore, my dear Brown, the strong est, the holiest wish of my life is to make her my wife. To you, as her natural protector, to her, as the arbiter of her own destiny, I now appeal on this auspicious occasion when my young friend Orpiment wears proudly in our presence his tripartite crown of riches, genius, and requited love. My dear Brown, may I have her? Miss Cale donia, will you be mine ? " " May he have you, Caledonia ? " " Oh, brother ! how can you ask ? It it shall be just as you say." "Then I say, and I say it heartily, my dear Gamboge, take her and God bless you both ! " and Mr. Mangan Brown led the blushing Miss Caledonia to Mr. Gamboge and placed her hand in his. ii 1 62 COLOR STUDIES. And so, young Orpiment having come into his fortune, and Mr. Gamboge having come into his kingdom, Mr. Orpiment s lease upon posterity was cancelled, and he really was dead at last. ROBERSON S MEDIUM. IT was Rowney Mauve who described Roberson as being like one of his own still-lifes : a lot of queer stuff badly com posed and out of drawing, and with his per spective all wrong. And I regret to add that it was Miss Carmine, when she heard this description, and recognized its accu racy, who giggled. To say that Violet Carmine was a pickle, is presenting a state ment of the case that is well within bounds. The arrival of this somewhat erratic young person in New York was unexpected, and had a rather dramatic touch about it. On a warm evening in September, while yet the dying splendor of sunset hung redly over the Jersey Highlands, Mr. Mangan Brown was sitting in a wicker-chair on the veranda of his own exceedingly comfort- 1 64 COLOR STUDIES. able home in West Eleventh Street. He was in the perfectly placid frame of mind that is the right of a man who has dined well, and who is smoking a good cigar. In another wicker-chair, similarly placid, simi larly smoking a good cigar, sat Vandyke Brown. And between the two sat Rose : whose nature was so sweet at all times, that even after-dinner cigars (supposing that she had been inclined to smoke them, and she was not) could not have made it one particle sweeter. These three people were very fond of each other : and they were talking away pleasantly about nothing in particular, and were gently light-hearted, and were having a deal of enjoyment in a quiet way, as they sat there, beneath their own vine and ailanthus tree, in the light of the mel low after-glow left when the sun went down. Their perfect peacefulness can be likened only to that of a tropical calm : and, there fore, the unities of the situation were pre served, though its placidity was shattered, when the calm was broken by what with a ROBERSOWS MEDIUM. 165 tolerable degree of accuracy may be describ ed as a tropical storm. Out of a coupe, that stopped with a flourish in front of Mr. Mangan Brown s gate, descended a tall young woman, with a good deal of color in her cheeks and a good deal of black hair and a pair of ex ceptionally bright black eyes. She carried a cage, in which was a large white cockatoo, in one hand, and with the other she opened the gate in a decisive sort of way, as though she had a right to open it ; and in a positive, proprietary fashion she traversed the walk of flags to the veranda steps. Mr. Mangan Brown arose from his wicker-chair some what reluctantly, for he was very comfort able and advanced to meet her. "You must be my cousin Mangan. I am very glad to see you, cousin Mangan. Won t you take the parrot, please ? " and the young person held out the cage in her left hand, and also extended her right hand with the obvious purpose of having it shaken. 1 66 COLOR STUDIES. Mr. Mangan Brown did his best to dis charge simultaneously the two duties thus demanded of him, but as this involved cross ing his hands in an awkward sort of way, the result was not altogether graceful. " My name is Mangan Brown," he said diplo matically. " Of course it is," answered the young woman with a smile that showed what a charming mouth and what prodigiously fine teeth she had. And my name is Violet Car mine. Don t you think Violet rather a pretty name, cousin Mangan ? My mamma gave it to me out of a novel. And don t you think that I speak very good English ? I haven t a strawberry mark on my left arm, nor any thing like that, you know, to prove it, but I am your cousin, your second cousin once re moved, just as much as though I had straw berry marks all over me. Don t look at me in that doubtful sort of way, cousin Man gan, it makes me feel quite uncomfortable. I m sure if I am willing to believe in you, you might be willing to believe in me. But XOBERSOA^S MEDIUM. l6/ here s papa s letter ; just read it, and then you ll believe in me, I m sure." Mr. Mangan Brown, who was rather dazed by this assault, took the letter and began to read it. " You re cousins, too, I suppose," said Miss Carmine, turning to Van and Rose. "Long cousin, won t you please go out to the carriage and pay the man and bring in my things?" As to you, you dear, little, blue-eyed cousin, I think that you are simply delightful, and I know that I shall love you with all my heart, and I must kiss you right away." And this Miss Carmine did with a fervor that was quite in keeping with the energy of her manner and words. "I am very glad to see you, my dear," said Mr. Mangan Brown, who had finished the letter. "This is my nephew, Vandyke Brown, and this is his wife, my niece Rose, and I am sure that we all will do our best to make you comfortable while you stay with us. If if I was not quite so cordial as I might have been just now, you must under- 1 68 COLOR STUDIES. stand that your sudden arrival rather took me by surprise, you know. Rose, take your cou sin Violet up to Caledonia s room, and make her comfortable. Van will carry up her bag. " "And, Rose dear/ said Miss Carmine, precisely imitating Mr. Mangan s tone and manner, "take your cousin Violet to where she will get something to eat, please. I assure you that she is almost starving." In her own proper voice she continued : " You sweet, little, blue-eyed thing, it was worth while coming all the way from Mexico just to have a sight of you. You are a lucky fellow, Van. I don t believe you half de serve her. Tell the truth now, do you ? But, of course, he ll say yes, Rose, so we need not wait for his answer. Take me along, dear, and let me wash myself and get some food. You really have no idea how hungry I am." And Miss Carmine, with her arm around Rose s waist, vanished through the open door. " Cool sort of hand, this cousin of ours," said Van to Mr. Mangan, when the bag and ROBFJtSOWS MEDIUM. l6g the parrot had been carried tip-stairs and Van had come down again to the veranda. "And who is she, anyway? She really is our cousin, I suppose." "Yes," said Mr. Mangan, in a tone that did its best to be cheerful, " there is no doubt about the relationship ; though it certainly is rather a distant one. Her great grandfather Carmine married my grand father s, Bone Brown s, sister. Carmine had a cochineal plantation in San Domingo, and he was killed in the time of the insurrection. In fact, his slaves burnt him. His son got away and went over to Mexico, and the family has been there ever since. The pres ent Carmine, Violet s father, has a big hacienda somewhere or another. We have a consignment of hides from him every year, and that s pretty much all that I know about him; except that in one of his letters he once said that he had married an American, and was bringing up his daughters I don t think he has any sons on the American plan ; teaching them to be self-confident, I7O COLOR STUDIES. and that sort of thing. And/ continued Mr. Mangan reflectively, " if this young per son is a fair specimen of the family, I should say that his educational methods had been, ah, quite a remarkable success." "Yes," answered Van, dryly, "I think they have. But to what fortunate circum stance do we owe the pleasure of her descent upon our inoffensive household ? " " Don t be inhospitable, Van. I m sure she s a nice girl, though she certainly is a little a little odd, perhaps. Why, her father writes that he has sent her up to see something of American life under my care he seems to take it for granted that I am married and have a lot of daughters and when her visit is ended (he suggests that she shall stay with us for a year, or for six months at the least), he wants me to come down to his place with all my family and stay a year or so with him. It s Mexican, I suppose, visiting in this fashion. I always have un derstood that they did not make much ac count of time down there." ROBERSON S MEDIUM. I/ 1 "But how on earth did she get here? Surely she did not come up alone? " " Really, Van," said Violet, stepping out upon the veranda briskly, just in time to hear these questions. " Really, Van, you don t look stupid, but I think you must be. I came, sir, in a delightful Pullman car, and the Sefior and Seftora Moreno I wonder if they can be distant relations of yours, cousin Mangan ? It s the same name, you know and all the thirteen, no, the fourteen, little Morenos and their nurses and servants brought me. We just filled the car nicely. And oh ! we did have such a good time ! Did you ever go anywhere in a Pullman car, cousin Mangan ? If you didn t, you don t know at all how nice it is. Not a bit like the horrid diligencia, you know. And we did have such fun ! I had my dear Pablo he s the parrot, you know ; and the Sefiora Moreno had a I don t know what the Eng lish name is : it s a bird that whistles and sings wonderfully; and little Josefiina had a yellow kitten ; and at Chihuahua each of the 1/2 COLOR STUDIES. seven boys bought a dear little dog. When Pablo was screaming, and the bird was whistling, and the kitten was fighting with all the little dogs at once, really, we could not hear ourselves speak. It was so funny that we were laughing every bit of the time. "And, cousin Mangan, Sefior Moreno wanted to come here with me and give me into your hands. But I wouldn t let him. They all stopped at a little hotel quite near here, where Spanish is spoken for Sefior Moreno does not speak a word of English, and I have done all the talking for him ever since we left Paso del Norte ; you have no idea what nice things the conductors and people have said to me about my English and I begged Sefior Moreno to let me come in the carriage by myself. I wanted to sur prise you, you see. Have I surprised you, cousin Mangan ? Tell me truly, have I ! " And Mr. Mangan Brown answered, in a tone that Miss Carmine, possibly, thought unnecessarily serious : " Yes, my dear, I ROBERSOWS MEDIUM. 1/3 believe that I may say with perfect truth you have ! " NATURALLY, so quiet a household as was this of Mr. Mangan Brown s was a good deal upset by having interjected into it such a whirlwind of a young woman as was this Miss Violet Carmine. The household was quieter than ever, of course, now that Miss Caledonia and Verona were married off. The wedding, by the way, was a prodigious success. Mr. Mangan Brown gave away the brides, successively, with a defiant one-down- and-t -other-come-on air that was tremen dously effective ; and young Orpiment went through with the ceremony gallantly; and Mr. Gamboge, who was badly scared, most certainly would have said " Under these cir cumstances Mr. Orpiment would have said I will, " if Miss Caledonia, being on the lookout for precisely this emergency, had not pinched him ; and Miss Caledonia looked so young and so pretty in her gray silk and new back hair that nobody ever would have 174 COLOR STUDIES. thought her a day over forty ; and Verona just looked like the lovable, dignified angel that she was. But while Miss Carmine found no difficulty in filling with her belongings the two rooms lately occupied by Miss Caledonia and Ve rona, it cannot be said that she herself filled precisely the place in the household which had been filled by these its departed mem bers. Mr. Mangan tried loyally to make the best of his Mexican kinswoman, but even he found her at times as he deprecatingly admitted to Rose a little wearing. He tried to convince himself that Pablo s violent remarks, in the Spanish tongue, at atrocious hours of the morning, did not disturb him ; he tried to believe that he admired the spirited playfulness of the seven little Moreno boys when they came to visit their country woman, and with their countrywoman and their seven Chihuahua dogs raced in and out of the parlor windows and up and down the veranda steps and all over the flower beds in the front garden ; and he tried to think ROBERSON S MEDIUM. 1/5 that his kinswoman s habitual tendency to ward the violent and the unexpected did not annoy him. But it is certain that his efforts in these, and in various other, directions were not at all times successful. And yet when Violet was not doing something out rageous which, to be sure, was not often she was such a frank, affectionate body that not to love her was quite impossible. " It s not herself, it s her extraordinary education that s at fault, Van," Mr. Mangan declared in extenuation of her expedition with Rowney Mauve and without a chaperon to Coney Island. " She s a good little thing, but what with her queer life on her father s hacienda, and the queer doctrines which her father and mother have got into her head, it s no wonder that her notions of propriety are a little eccentric." Being lectured about her Coney Island trip, Violet manifested only astonishment. "Why, cousin Mangan, I thought that here in America girls could do just as they pleased. That s what mamma has always told me. 1/ COLOR STUDIES. I m sure that she did what she pleased when she was a girl. And mamma was very care fully brought up and moved in very elegant society, you know. Grandpapa, you know, sold outfits at Fort Leavenworth to people going across the Plains ; and he did a splen did business, too, in the Santa Fe trade. That was before the railroad, of course. Were you ever out along the Santa Fe trail before the Atchison road was built, cousin Mangan ? It was a splendid trip to make. Mamma came out that way to Santa F in 1860 with grandpapa. They had a lovely time ; just as full of excitement as possible. They had one fight with Indians before they were fifty miles out from Council Grove, and another just as they struck off from the Arkansas, and another at the crossing of the Cimarron ; and they were caught in a tre mendous snow-storm in the Raton Moun tains ; and in fording the Pecos they lost a wagon and its team of six mules and grand papa was so angry with the head teamster for his carelessness, that he just picked him ROBERSON S MEDIUM. 177 up bodily and chucked him in after the mules, and then shot at him when he tried to swim ashore ; and mamma used to say in her droll way that they never knew whether that team ster died of drowning or shooting. " It was in Santa Fe, you know, that papa met mamma and fell in love with her. It was very romantic. Mamma had made a bet with one of the officers of the garrison that she could ride a mustang that never had been broken; and it ran away with her which mamma did not mind a bit, of course and just as she was waving her handker chief to the men to show that she was win ning the bet she found that the mustang was heading right for the edge of the bluff she was riding on the mesa close by old Fort Marcy an d as she couldn t turn it she knew that they both were going to have their necks broken. And then papa, who was with the officers, saw her danger and galloped up just in time to lift her right out of the saddle while both horses were running as hard as ever they could run ; and papa man- COLOR STUDIES. aged to turn his horse on the very edge of the bluff, and the mustang went over the bluff and was done for. Of course, after he had saved her life this way, and after he had fought a duel with the officer that mamma bet with, because he said that mamma had not won the bet after all, mamma had to marry him. They had a lovely wedding in the old church of San Miguel, and all the officers were there the officer whom papa wounded was ever so nice about it and came on crutches and all the best people of the town were there too, and they had a splendid banquet at the Fonda afterward. You see, there was no trouble about their being mar ried, for mamma was born in the Church. Her mother s folks, the Smalts, were German Catholics, and, of course, her father was a Catholic too, for he was Don Patricio O Jara, you know. The O Jaras are a very noble family, cousin Mangan ; some of them once were kings, mamma says. "And because she belonged to such a grand family, and because grandpapa was so ROBERSOWS MEDIUM. 1/9 rich, mamma moved in the very highest cir cles of Leavenworth society, you see ; and I am sure that she went around with young gentlemen just as much as she pleased, for she has told me so, often. So what was the harm in my going to Coney Island with Mr. Mauve, cousin Mangan ? And we did have sucli a lovely time ! Now you aren t angry with me, are you ? Then kiss me, and say you re not so. That s a dear. And now we never will say another word about the horrid place again." Rowney Mauve, of course, knew that the Coney Island expedition was all wrong ; and he had the grace to profess to be sorry when Van took it on himself to give him a lecture about it. Rowney was a rather weak vessel, morally as he admitted with a charming frankness when anybody spoke to him on the subject and he never made any very per ceptible effort to strengthen himself. It wasn t his ambition to be a whited sepulchre, he would say, with an air of cheerful resigna tion that, in its way, was quite irresistible. 180 COLOR STUDIES. But, after all, he was not half a bad fellow at bottom. His besetting sin was his laziness. Unless he had some scheme of pleasure on hand when he would rouse up and work like a beaver he was about as lazy as a man well could be. Had he ever buckled down to work, there was the making of a first-rate painter in him. Two or three landscapes which, by some extraordinary chance, he had finished, had been quite the talk of the town and had sold promptly. But there he stopped. " Of course, old man, I know that I could sell a lot of pictures if I painted them," he would say when Van upbraided him for his laziness. "But what s the good of it? I don t need the money. I ve got more now than I know what to do with." And then he would add, in the high moral key and with the twinkle in the corners of his blue eyes that always came there in nice ap preciation of his own humbug, "And I don t think it s right, Van, you know, to sell my pictures and so take the bread out of the mouths of the men who need it. No, I pre ROBEKSOWS MEDIUM. l8l fer to be as that cheerful old father-in-law of yours once said to me when he sent his Baby s First Steps to the Young Genius s exhibition, and the Young Geniuses cracked it right back at him * a willing sacrifice for Art s great sake to other men s success. That s a noble sentiment, isn t it ? And now, what do you say to joining me on board the yacht to-morrow and sliding down to Saint Augustine for a week or two ? There are some types among those stunning Minorcan girls down there that will make you a bigger swell in art than ever if you will catch them in time for the spring exhibition." The fact of the matter was that Rowney Mauve, in the matter of laziness, simply was incorrigible. In connection with Miss Carmine, how ever, not the least trace of Rowney s lazi ness was perceptible. In her service he was all energy. Why, he even went so far as to finish one of his numerous unfinished pict ures because, when Van and Rose brought her to his studio one day, she took a fancy to it and told him that she would like to see 1 82 COLOR STUDIES, it completed ! Among the people who knew him this outburst of zealous labor was regarded as being little short of miraculous ; and Rowney, who was rather given to con templative consideration of his own actions, could not help at first feeling that way about it himself. As the result of careful self- analysis, however, he came to the conclusion that his sudden access of energy was not the result of a miracle, but of love ! Being really in love was a new experience for Rowney, and he did not quite under stand it. At one time or another he had been spoons on lots of girls ; but being spoons and being genuinely in love, as he now perceived, were conditions of the heart which have no relation to each other what ever. Looking at his case critically, he was satisfied that his decline and fall had begun on that October day, now four months past, when he and Miss Carmine had defied the proprieties by going down together to Coney Island. They had seen the races, which Violet enjoyed immensely, and had had a ROBERSOWS MEDIUM. 183 capital little lunch ; and after the lunch they had taken a long walk on the deserted beach toward Far Rockaway. Rowney knew all the while, of course, that they hadn t any business whatever to be off alone on a cruise of this nature ; and his knowledge, I am sorry to say, made him regard the cruise in the light of a lark of quite exceptional jollity. Violet, not having the faintest suspicion that she was anything less than a model of American decorum, simply was in raptures. With a delightful frankness she repeatedly told Rowney what a good time she was having ; and how like it was to the good times that her mother, the scion of the royal house of O Jara, used to have in company with the young Chesterfields of Fort Leaven- worth society. Altogether, it had been an original sort of an experience for Rowney ; and for this easy-going young gentleman original ex- periences had an exceeding great charm. Looking back, therefore, in the light of sub sequent events, upon that particular day, he 1 84 COLOR STUDIES. decided that it was the Coney Island expe dition that had sapped the foundations of his previously well-fortified heart. Anyhow, without regard to when it began, he felt satisfied in his own mind that he was in love now, right over head and ears. Roberson, whose studio was just across the passage, happened to drop in upon him at the very moment that he had arrived at this, to him, astonishing conclusion. Rober son was not a very promising sort of a speci men of a confidant, but Rowney was so full of his discovery that before he could check himself he had blurted out : " Old man, I ve been and gone and done it ! I m in love ! " "No! Are you though, really?" said Roberson, in his funny little mincing way. "Why, that s very interesting. And who are you in love with ? " By this time Rowney had perceived the absurdity, not to say the stupidity, of taking Roberson into his confidence. So he laughed and answered : " With my own laziness, of course. I ve ROBERSON S MEDIUM. 185 been thinking what a precious ass I have been making of myself in working over this confounded picture. Now that it s finished, I don t know what to do with it, and I ve wasted a solid month that I might have de voted to scientific loafing. And it s because I see my folly and am determined to be wise again that I ve fallen in love with my own laziness once more." "Oh! " said Roberson, in a tone of dis appointment, " I thought that you were in earnest ; and I was ever so glad, for I really am in love, Rowney, in love awfully ! And and I thought that if you were in love too, you d like to hear about it. Wouldn t you like to hear about it anyway ? " " Of course I would, old man. Just wait till I fill my pipe ; I can be more sympa thetic over a pipe, you know. Now crack away," Rowney continued, as he settled himself comfortably in a big chair and pulled hard at his pipe to give it a good start. " Now crack away, my stricken deer. Though the herd all forsake thee, thy home 1 86 COLOR STUDIES. is still here, you know. Rest on this bosom and tell your tale of sorrow. Are you very hard hit, Roberson ? " " Oh ! I am, indeed, I am," groaned Roberson. " You see, its its this queer Mexican girl who is staying with the Browns " " The dickens it is ! " exclaimed Rowney, suddenly sitting bolt upright in his chair, and glaring at Roberson through the smoke as though he wanted to glare his head off. " Don t, please don t look at me like that, Mauve. Surely there s no reason why you should be angry with me." " N no," answered Rowney slowly, " I don t think there is." And then, as he sank back in the chair, and his ferocious expres sion gave place to a quiet grin, he added briskly : " No, I m sure there s not. I was surprised, that s all. I always look like that when I m a good deal surprised." " Well, I must say I m glad I don t sur prise you often. You have no idea how savage you looked, old fellow. I m not ROBERSON 1 S MEDIUM. l8/ easily frightened, you know," and the little man put on a look of inoffensive defiance as he spoke that gave him something the air of a valorously-disposed lamb ; " but I do as sure you that the way you looked at me gave me quite a turn. Just let me know, won t you, when you feel yourself beginning to be surprised the next time, so that I may be prepared for it ? " "Til do better than that, Roberson ; I ll promise not to let you surprise me. And now go ahead with the love story, old man ; I m quite ashamed of myself for having in terrupted you so rudely." " There isn t any more of it to tell," said Roberson, dolefully. " I wish there was." " Nonsense, man ! Why, that isn t any love story at all. There must be more of it. What have you said to her ? What has she said to you ? " " Nothing," answered Roberson, dismally. " That s just it, you see. That s what makes me so low in my mind over it. I haven t said anything, and she hasn t said anything. 1 88 COLOR STUDIES. If either of us had said anything I d know better where I was. But neither of us has spoken, and so I don t know where I am at all not the least bit in the world." Rober- son hid his face in his hands and groaned. Presently he went on again: "I have made efforts to speak, Rowney ; I ve made repeated efforts but, somehow, they ve none of them come to anything. Indeed, I ve never had but one fair chance, for every time, just as I ve got to the point when I was ready to say something, something that really would have a meaning to it, you know, something has happened to stop me." " And what stopped you that one time when something didn t happen to stop you ? " "You mustn t think me weak, Rowney, but but the truth is that I was so dreadfully upset that what I wanted to say wouldn t come at all. We were sitting on the veran da, the moon was shining, and all the rest were inside listening to Mrs. Orpiment sing ing. I couldn t have had a better chance, you see." ROBERSON S MEDIUM. " I should think not ! " growled Rowney. " But the more I tried the more the right words wouldn t come. And what do you suppose I ended by asking her ? " " If she didn t think you were an infernal idiot. And of course she said yes." " Don t be hard on me, Mauve. You ve no idea what a trying situation it was. No, what I ended by asking her was, what was the food most commonly eaten in Mexico. I didn t say it in just a commonplace way, you know. I threw a great deal of feeling into my voice, and I looked at her beseech ingly. And and I think, old fellow, that she knew that my words meant more than they expressed, for there was a strange tremor in her own voice as she answered, tortillas and frijoles ; and as soon as she had uttered those brief words she got up and rushed into the parlor, as though something were after her. This was a very extraordi nary thing for her to do, and it shows to my mind that she did not dare to trust herself with me for a moment longer. And I am 190 COLOR STUDIES. the more confirmed in this opinion by the fact that when I followed her, in a minute or two, for at first I was too much surprised by her sudden departure to stir, I found her leaning upon Mrs. Brown s shoulder in hys terics laughing and crying all at once, I solemnly assure you. Don t you think there s hope for me in all this, Rowney ? Don t you think that her saying tortillas and fri- joles in that strange, tremulous tone, and then having hysterics after it, meant more than I could understand at the time ? " " Yes," answered Rowney, decidedly, " I think it did. To be quite frank with you, Roberson, I don t think that you fully under stand just what she meant even yet." " Oh, thank you, thank you, Mauve. You don t know how much good you are doing me by your kind, encouraging words." Rowney s conscience did prick him a little when Roberson said this but only a little, for his resentment of what he styled in his own mind Roberson s confounded impu dence in venturing to make love to Violet, ROBERSOWS MEDIUM. IQI was too keen for him to give the unlucky little man mercy in the least degree. For a while there was silence. Mauve pulled away steadily at his pipe, and Rober- son stared gloomily into vacancy and gently wrung his hands. At last he spoke : " Rowney, do you believe that there is anything in in spiritualism ?" " There s dollars in it, if you only can make it go. Why ? Are you thinking of taking it up as a profession ? It s rather a shady profession, of course ; but you ought to make more out of it than you do out of your still-life stuff. The properties wouldn t take much capital to start with. Two rooms in an out-of-the-way street Grove Street would do nicely ; some curtains, and a table ; that s all you d need to begin with. If things went along well, and you found that there was a paying demand for materi alizations, then you d have to get some cos tumes. And what awfully good fun it will be ! " Rowney continued, as he warmed up to the subject. " Do you know, I ve a great 1 92 COLOR STUDIES. mind to go in with you. It will be no end of a lark." " Oh, you don t understand me at all, Mauve. I don t want to be a medium. What I mean is, do you believe in the reality of spiritual manifestations ? " Rowney was about to say spiritual fiddle-sticks," but checked himself, and answered diplomatically : " Well, you see, I haven t much experience in that line, and so my opinion isn t especially valuable. Have you ever tackled the spirits yourself, Roberson ? " " Ye-es," answered Roberson, hesitat ingly, " I have." " And what sort of a time did you have with them ? " " Well but you won t laugh at me, will you, Mauve ? I m really in earnest, you know, and if you only want to make a joke of it, I won t go on." " Don t you see how serious I am ? " " Well, some of the spirits did tell me very wonderful things. Do you remember ROBERSOWS MEDIUM. IQ3 that picture that I painted a year ago last winter peas, and asparagus, and Bermuda potatoes, and strawberries, grouped around a shad that I called The First Breath of Spring ? I don t think that you can have forgotten it, for it was a noble work. Well, the spirit of Jan Weenix told me to paint that picture, and promised me that it would bring me fortune and fame." " Why, I saw it in your studio only yes terday, with a lot of other stuff piled up in a corner. Not much fame or fortune there, apparently. If that s the sort of game that the spirits come on you, I should say that they lie like Ananias and Sapphira." "Hush! don t speak that way, please. We never know what Form hovers near." (Roberson said this so earnestly that, involuntarily, Rowney glanced over his shoulder.) " It is true that the promise made by the spirit of Jan Weenix has not yet been fulfilled ; but, you know, there s no telling at what moment it will be. Every time that I hear a strange step on the stairs, 194 COLOR STUDIES. I say to myself : He comes ! The Pur chaser comes and with him come Fortune and Fame ! And though I m bound to admit I haven t seen the least sign of him yet, that only assures me that I have so much the less time to wait for his coming. " Yes, I believe in the spirits thoroughly, Mauve. Every action of my life, for years past, has been guided by them. And I believe that it is because I have not their guidance in this great matter of my love that I am going all wrong." " What s the reason they won t guide you now ? Have you had a row with em ? " " I do wish that you wouldn t speak in that irreverent way. No, the trouble is that the medium whom I have been in the habit of consulting for years has has gone away. In point of fact " Roberson blushed a little, " he has been arrested for swindling. It is a great outrage, of course, and I am desper ately sorry for him. But I am more sorry for myself. You see, getting a new medium is a very difficult matter. It is not only that ROBERSON S MEDIUM. 195 he must be a good medium intrinsically, but he must possess a nature that easily becomes en rapport with mine. When I began this conversation, it was in the faint hope that you also might be a believer and might be able to help me in my quest ; but I see now that this hope has no foundation. I must search on, alone and until I find what I re quire I shall toss aimlessly upon the ocean of life like a rudderless ship in a storm. Don t think me ungrateful, old man, because I am so melancholy. Your sympathy has cheered me up ever so much. Indeed, I haven t been so light-hearted since I don t know when " and with tears in his eyes and sorrow stamped upon every line of his face Roberson gently minced his way out of the room. " I say, Roberson !" Rowney called after him. " I ve a notion that I know a medium who is just the very card you want. I ll look him up, and if he s what I think he is, I ll pass him along to you." " Oh, thank you, thank you very much, 196 COLOR STUDIES. Mauve," said Roberson, putting his head in at the door again. " It s ever so good of you to think of taking this trouble on my ac count. But if you will find me a new me dium, a good one, you know, that I can trust implicitly, you really will make a new man of me." And uttering these hopeful words Roberson closed the door. For an hour or more Rowney Mauve con tinued to sit and smoke in the big chair. During this period he grinned frequently, and once he laughed aloud. When at last he stood up and knocked the ashes from his third pipe, it was with the satisfied air of a man who has formulated an Idea. AT the outset of this narrative the fact has been mentioned that Violet Carmine was a pickle. The additional fact may be appro priately mentioned here that a residence of five months in the stimulating atmosphere of New York had not by any means tended to make her less picklesome. Except in the case of Mr. Mangan Brown, who stood by ROBERSON S MEDIUM. 197 her loyally, she was the despair of the Elev enth Street household ; and she was not favor ably commented upon abroad. After that dinner at the Gamboges when Violet flirted so outrageously with young Orpiment that even Verona s placid spirit was ruffled Mrs. Gamboge said to Mr. Gamboge, in the pri vacy of their own chamber, that she was very sure that this wild Mexican-Irish girl would bring all their gray hairs down in sorrow to the grave. Mr. Gamboge, who had a rather soft spot in his heart for Violet, and to whom the mystery of Miss Caledonia s back hair was a mystery no longer, glanced shrewdly at the toilet-table, grinned in a manner that was highly exasperating, and made no reply. Mr. Gamboge regretted his adoption of this line of rejoinder ; but Mrs. Gamboge hav ing suffered peace to be restored when she found herself in possession of the Indian shawl for which her heart had panted all win ter long inclined to the opinion that bru tality was not without its compensating ad vantages, after all. IQ8 COLOR STUDIES. And being a pickle, Violet threw herself, heart and soul, into the part assigned to her by Rowney Mauve in the realization of his Idea. " It s delightful, Rowney ! "-" Mamma always used to call her gentlemen friends at Fort Leavenworth by their first names, cou sin Mangan. I am sure that you might let me do what mamma did," Miss Carmine had observed with dignity, when Mr. Mangan had suggested to her one day that this some what unceremonious mode of address might be modified advantageously. "It s delightful, Rowney! Really, I didn t think that you had the wit to think of doing anything so funny. Of course, I ll keep as dark about it as possible. If that sweet little Rose were to get wind of it, I believe she d faint ; and funny little old cousin Caledonia would have a fit ; and Van would be seriously horrified and disagreeable. And even cousin Mangan, who is the dear est dear that ever was, wouldn t like it ; and he d end by coaxing me out of it, I m sure. ROBERSON^S MEDIUM. 1 99 And I don t want to be coaxed out of it, Rowney, for it will be the best bit of fun that I ever had anything to do with. But I ll have to have somebody along, you know. And I ll tell you who it will be : that nice Rose d Antimoine ! She s just as bad as they all say I am. I don t think that I m very bad, Rowney; do you? Only she s sly, and knows how to pretend that she isn t. May I tell her about it, and ask her to take a hand ? You d better say yes, for unless she comes in I ll stay out, you know." Rowney, who was acquainted only with society young American women, and to whom the natural young American woman s instinct of self-preservation, that is most shrewdly manifested in her determination always to have one of her sex with her in her escapades, was unknown, was rather staggered by this proposition, and was dis posed to raise objections to it. But Miss Carmine gave him to understand in short order that his objections could not be enter- 200 COLOR STUDIES. tained for a moment. He would do what she wanted, she told him decidedly, or he would not do anything at all. And Rowney, not altogether unwillingly, for he did not want to get Violet into a scrape, gave in. Therefore the aid of Madame d Antimoine was sought, and was given with effusion ; for marriage had not tended to make her take a view of life much more serious than that which she had entertained when her scandalous flirtation with the " Marquis" had driven poor Jaune almost to extremities. So these three lively young people laid their reprehensible heads together, and if Rober- son s ears did not burn, it was no fault of theirs. It was the morning after this conference that Rowney Mauve dropped in upon Rober- son in his studio. " Oh ! I m ever so glad to see you, Mauve," said Roberson. " I was just wishing for some body to come in to tell me about this thing. I m not satisfied with it exactly, and yet I don t know what there is wrong about it ROBERSON S MEDIUM. 2OI either. I must explain though what I m driving at. I call it The Real and the Ideal/ though I ve been thinking that pos sibly High Life and Low Life will be better. On this side, you see, I have a pile of tur nips and a cabbage and a mackerel, and on this side a vase of roses and a glass globe with goldfish in it. The idea s capital con trast and that sort of thing, you know. But somehow the picture don t seem to come together. I ve changed the composition two or three times, but I don t seem to get what I want. I do wish that you d give me your advice about it, what you honestly think, you know." "To tell the truth, Roberson, the way you ve got it now the things all jumbled together in a heap like that it looks a good deal like nine-pins after the first ball has cracked into em." "No? does it though? Why, I do be lieve you re right, Mauve. I ve been think ing myself that perhaps the composition was too scattery. And yet I think there s a good 202 COLOR STUDIES. effect in the way that they rise gradually from this one turnip here on the left to the roses on the right. I can t paint out those roses again, they re too good don t you think that they re better than Lambdin s ? I do. But I might move the globe of goldfish over to the left, and then have the mackerel and the vegetables along in a row between it and the roses. How do you think that would do ? I ve got to do something in a hurry, for the mackerel is beginning to smell horri bly. I hope you don t find it very bad. I put carbolic acid over it this morning. Oh dear ! Mauve. I don t seem to be able to do anything in these days ; now now," and Roberson s voice became lower and had a tone of awe in it, " that I no longer have a Guide, you know." " That s just what I came to speak to you about, Roberson." " Goodness gracious ! Mauve, you don t mean to say that you have that you have found a Medium ? " exclaimed Roberson in great excitement, springing up from his chair ROBERSON S MEDIUM. 203 and dropping his palette and mahlstick with a clatter. " That is just what I do mean to say, old man ; but I wish that you wouldn t jump around so. It disturbs the atmosphere and makes the smell of the fish worse." " Oh ! I beg your pardon. Just wait a minute and I ll put some more carbolic acid on it. Now tell me about him. Is he really a good medium? Have you tested him? Is he knocks, or voices, or a slate ? Is he " " He isn t he at all ; he s a she." "A she ?" " Yes, a woman medium, you know." <( Oh," said Roberson, doubtfully, and with less brightness in his face, " I ve never tried a woman medium. Do you think they re apt to be as good as men ? " " Not as a rule," Rowney answered, in the grave, careful tone of one who had given the subject a very thorough investigation and whose decision was final. " No, not as a rule ; but as an exception, yes. Dugald Stuart, in his admirable chapter on clairvoy- 204 COLOR STUDIES. ance spiritualism hadn t come up in his day, you know says that the delicate, super-sensitive nerve-fibre of women renders them far more keenly acute to psychic influ ences than are men. It is for this reason that women, and women only, have given us trustworthy evidences of clairvoyant phenom ena. The eminent Professor Crookes, during his recent exhaustive and most fruit ful experiments upon the element to which he has given the name of psychic force, has arrived at a conclusion which substantially is identical with that arrived at by the great Scotch philosopher. He says, clearly and positively, while the majority of my experi ments with women have been failures, it is a notable fact that of all my experiments the only ones which have been completely and entirely satisfactory have been those in which the operating force was a woman ; and from this fact I conclude that only in the exqui sitely sensitive nervous structure of women can proper media for the most interesting, the most astonishing class of psychic phe- KOBERSON S MEDIUM. 205 nomena be found. Now what can you say in opposition to this positively expressed opin ion of the great English scientist? Surely, Roberson, you will not have the temerity, not to say the downright impudence, to set up your opinion, based only on your own meagre experience, against that of this pro found investigator ; against the dictum of the man who has invented the Radiometer ? " Roberson was greatly astonished, as well as greatly impressed, by this eloquent and learned outburst and he was a good deal puzzled, later, when his most diligent search through the works of the authors named failed to discover the passages, or anything at all like them, that Rowney had quoted. " What a wonderful fellow you are, Mauve ! " he said, admiringly. " I had no idea that you had gone into the matter in this serious way." " Well, when I set out to know anything, I do like to know it pretty thoroughly," Rowney answered airily. " But I hope that what I ve said has weakened your prejudice 206 COLOR STUDIES. against women-mediums. A man of your strong intellect, Roberson, has no right to entertain a prejudice like that. Of course, though, if you don t believe in women-mediums, we will say no more about this one that I have found for you." " Oh, please don t speak that way, Mauve. I see that I have been very foolish, and I want to meet this one very much, indeed. Who is she ? " " She s aTheosoph." " A what?" "A Theosoph a member of that won derful and mysterious Oriental Cult that Madame Blavatsky so ably has expounded. But, of course, you know all about Theo- sophism ? " " I know about it in a general way, you know. It s something like like animal magnetism, isn t it ? " " Yes, it s something of that general nature." Rowney found that he was getting into rather deep water himself, and he floundered a little in getting out of it. ROBERSON S MEDIUM. 2VJ il Yes, it s like animal magnetism in a gen eral sort of way. And having this magnetic basis, you see, of course, it affords a won derfully perfect channel for communication with the spirit world." " Of course," Roberson assented. "And this particular medium," Rowney continued, speaking with confidence again, now that the awkward turn in the conversa tion was safely past, " is without exception the most extraordinary medium that even Theosophism has produced. She does everything that ordinary mediums do, and some most astonishing things that they don t. Of course you ve seen materializa tions, Roberson ? " " Oh, yes, repeatedly." " But of people who were dead ? " " Of course." " Well, this Theosoph will show you, will actually show you materializations of the living." " You don t say ! " said Roberson, greatly interested. 208 COLOR STUDIES. t( It s a fact, I assure you. This has never been done before, and even she has been able to do it only recently after twelve years of study among the oldest Pajamas of the Cult in India. It s wonderful ! And what is more, she can materialize inanimate objects can make things in distant places appear visibly before your eyes. Of course she can do the trance business, and knocks, and slate writing, and all that sort of thing, you might say, with one hand." " Wonderful ! wonderful ! " exclaimed Roberson. "Right you are, my boy. She is the most wonderful medium that the world, at least the Western World, has ever known. She is she is what a Colorado newspaper person would call a regular daisy, and no mistake ! " " And when can I see her, and where ? Oh, Mauve, my heart is beginning to brighten again. I m sure that she will set me in the right way again about my pict ures, and and about Violet, you know." KOBERSOA^S MEDIUM. 209 It was with some difficulty that Rowney restrained his strong desire to box Rober- son s ears for this free use of Miss Carmine s name. But he did restrain himself, and answered: "You shall see her this very night, and in my studio. She is here in New York only for a day or two she starts for India again at the end of the week and has no regular place for her seances, so I have arranged with her to come to my studio this evening at eight o clock. Will that suit you ? " " Yes, yes; and thank you a thousand times, Mauve. I shall be grateful to you all my life for what you have done." " Will you, though ? Don t be too sure about that," said Rowney with a queer smile. " Good-by till eight o clock. Phew ! how that fish does smell! " EGYPTIAN darkness reigned in Rowney Mauve s studio when Roberson entered it at eight o clock that evening. Roberson did not more than half like this gloom and mys- 210 COLOR STUDIES. tery. Rowney, leading him to a seat, felt that he was trembling. " Has the Indian lady come yet ? " he asked in a shaky voice. " The Theosoph ? Yes, here she is. Per mit me to present to you, madame, an ear nest seeker after truth." " It is well," was answered in a deep voice that quavered as though with sup pressed emotion. "What seeks this earn est seeker ? " " Now, crack away and ask about the picture. You d better begin with that, and take the other matter afterward," Rowney whispered. " Mustn t I call up an advising spirit first ? That s the usual way of beginning a stance, you know." " Oh, of course, that s what I meant you to do," Rowney answered, in some slight confusion. "Is the spirit of Jan Weenix present?" asked Roberson. There was a regular volley of raps, and then the deep voice answered " He is ! " ROBERSON S MEDIUM. 211 (" // is ; there is no sex in spirits," mur mured Rowney, sotto voce.) " I am ever so glad to meet you again," Roberson said, quite in the tone of one who greets an old friend after a long separation. " I m dreadfully muddled about this new picture of mine, High Life and Low Life, you know. Won t you please tell me what I must do to get it right ? " " Behold it as the great Weenix himself has painted it ! " and the deep voice was deeper, and also shakier than ever. " Now you will see one of the wonderful materializations that I told you about," Rowney whispered. " Only the most highly- gifted even of the Theosophs can do this sort of thing. Look ! " In one corner of the room there appeared a soft, hazy glow, covering a space of about three feet square. The haze passed slowly away, and as the brightness increased, a picture became visible. It was Roberson s picture, sure enough, but the composition had been modified materially. The rosebush was in 212 COLOR STUDIES. the centre ; on one side of it was the glass globe, filled with the vegetables ; on the other side was the mackerel, standing straight up on its tail, while the four goldfish, stand ing on their tails and touching fins, were circling around it in a waltz. " Oh ! " was all that Roberson could say on beholding this astonishing rearrangement of his work. " Now, isn t that wonderful ? " Rowney asked impressively. " Ye es, it certainly is," Roberson answered with hesitation. "At least it s very wonderful as a materialization ; indeed, I never saw anything like it. But but really, you know, Mauve, this arrangement of the picture is a most extraordinary one. Is it possible, do you think, that a malignant spirit has obtained control of the medium ? You know that does happen sometimes." " Like getting the wrong fellow at the telephone," suggested Rowney. " Precisely," Roberson answered. " And what do you do then ? With the ROBERSOWS MEDIUM. 213 telephone you ring for the exchange again and swear at them. But that wouldn t do with the spirits, I suppose." Of course not," said Roberson, a good deal horrified. " No, the proper thing to do when this happens is to drop all attempts to communicate with the spirit that has been called, and the effort of which to come has been frustrated, and to continue the seance with others less susceptible to malignant in fluences." " With the Theosophs the custom differs a little. Being more potent than ordinary mediums, they usually insist upon the at tendance of the spirit called. Still, it might be well in this case to adopt the plan that you mention. Suppose you go right ahead and demand a materialization of Miss Car mine, and then have things out with her." " You don t mean to say that the medium can do that?" " Indeed I do. Didn t I tell you that these Theosophs could materialize living people ? You don t seem to understand, 214 COLOR STUDIES. Roberson, what a tremendous power is here at our command. But I ll manage it for you." And Rowney continued in a deep, solemn tone: "Madam, I conjure you to compel the visible presence of the spirit of Violet Carmine." As Rowney ceased speaking, the materi alized picture vanished, the hazy light dis appeared, and profound darkness came again. Then the phenomenon of the grad ual appearance of the light was repeated ; but this time they beheld behind the misty veil not Roberson s reconstructed picture, but the wraith of Violet herself. Oddly enough, the beautiful apparition seemed to be doing its best not to laugh. Roberson was so overpowered by this astounding sight that he was speechless. It was monstrous, this awful power that could subject a living being to its sway, so far be yond anything that he ever had encountered in the course of his spiritual investigations, that a great fear seized him. Cold perspiration started upon his forehead, and his knees shook. ROBERSON S MEDIUM. 21 5 " Well, you goose, now that I m here haven t you anything to say for yourself? Can t you even ask me about what people eat in Mexico?" Voice, tone, and manner were Violet s to the life. It was too much for Roberson. His demoralization was com plete. " Mauve ! Mauve ! for heaven s sake help me to get away ! This is no ordinary me dium. It is the very Power of Evil that we have invoked I " " That s a pretty compliment to pay a lady, now isn t it ? " and the apparition spoke with a certain amount of sharpness. " As I didn t come here to be called bad names, I shall l eav e_and the next time that you have a chance to speak to me you ll be apt to know it, my lad ! " with these decisive words Miss Carmine s wraith faded away, and the misty light slowly vanished into darkness. "Oh take me away! take me away!" moaned Roberson feebly. In his terror he had sunk down in a little heap of misery upon the floor. 2l6 COLOR STUDIES. "All right, old man. Just wait half a minute, though, until I speak a word to the Theosoph." Roberson heard Rowney cross the room ; perceived a momentary gleam of light such as might come when a curtain that conceals a lamp is quickly raised and quickly dropped again and then came the sound of whisper ing. Roberson s fear was leaving him a lit tle now ; but in the darkness, without Row ney to guide him, he did not dare to stir. Suddenly the whispering, becoming less guarded, was audible. "You shan t! Go away! " " I shall ! I can t help it ! You ve no idea what a lovely ghost you made ! " Then there was a sound of a scuffle, that ended in a crash and there, seen in a blaze of light over the fallen screen, was Rowney Mauve in the very act of kissing Violet Car mine. The whole apparatus of the trick was disclosed. In the part of the screen that re mained standing was the square hole where the picture had been visible ; and the gradual ROBERSON S MEDIUM. coming and going of the light, and its misti ness, were accounted for by the dozen or so of gauze curtains arranged to draw back one by one. And there was the picture itself even more shocking when seen clearly than when hidden by the misty veil. On the outer side of the screen, where she could man age the curtains, stood Rose d Antimoine. As he sat there on the floor and perceived by these several disclosures how careful the preparations had been for making a fool of him, and as he painfully realized how admir ably well he had been fooled, fear ceased to hold possession of Roberson, and in its place came spiteful rage. " It s a nasty, mean trick that you have played on me ; and I ll get even with you for it, see if I don t ! You ought to be ashamed of yourselves, every one of you ; and I ll make you ashamed, too, before I get through with you." " Oh, come now, old fellow, it was only a joke you know. Don t be unreasonable about it and raise a row." 2l8 COLOR STUDIES. "You may think it a joke, Mauve, to have these ladies here at your studio at night, and to go on in that scandalous way with Miss Carmine, but I don t think that either Mr. d Antimoine or Mr. Brown will see anything much of a joke in it ! Oh, you ll all repent this ! I ll teach you to play tricks ! I ll fix you, you mean things ! " Roberson s voice, never a deep one, rose to a shrill treble as he delivered these threats, and in a perfect little whirl of fury he rushed out of the room. The fact must be admitted that the three conspirators, being thus delivered over into the hands of their intended victim, were pretty badly crest-fallen. They knew that Roberson certainly had it in his power to make things exceedingly unpleasant for them ; and they knew, too, that he cer tainly intended to use his power to the very uttermost. Decidedly, the outlook was not a cheerful one. As they left the studio, and the wreck of their spirit-raising apparatus, they all three were in a chastened and melan choly frame of mind. ROBERSON S MEDIUM. 2 19 "THERE S been a dreadful rumpus, Row- ney," Violet said, when, as they had agreed, they met in the friendly shelter of Madame d Antimoine s drawing-room the next after noon. " That mean little Roberson has told everybody everything, and and hot water s no name for it ! Mr. and Mrs. d Antimoine have had a regular squabble, though they ve made things up now ; and Rose has been crying till her lovely blue eyes are all swollen and ugly ; and Van is in a perfect Apache rage ; and Verona is dignifiedly disagreeable ; and little Mrs. Gamboge got so excited and indignant that her back-hair all went crooked and nearly came off, and she had to go up stairs and fix it ; and dear little Mr. Gamboge looks solemnly at me, and I heard him say as I came by the parlor-door : I am sure that Mr. Orpiment would not have hesitated to characterize such conduct as highly repre hensible. And the wo-worst of all, Rowney," and Violet s voice broke and her eyes had tears in them, " is that cousin Mangan won t get comfortably angry and have it out with 22O COLOR STUDIES. me, but is just miserable and mopes. All that he said to me was : Mr. Roberson has told me something that I have been very sorry to hear, my child, and his voice didn t sound right, and I know that he wanted to cry. O Rowney, I m the most wretched girl in the world ! " Rowney was feeling pretty low in his mind already, and this frank avowal of her misery by Violet made him feel a great deal lower ; and he was cut the more keenly because neither by her words nor her manner did she imply that he was the cause of it as he most certainly was. " I am very, very sorry," he said. "Yes, I m sure you are, Rowney; and its ever so good of you, you dear boy. You see you see," and Violet blushed delight fully, "what upsets them all so is your your kissing me that way. Of course I know that you didn t mean anything by it, and I m sure I don t see why they make such a fuss about it. Mamma has told me that several of her gentlemen friends at Fort Leaven- XOBERSOWS MEDIUM. 221 worth used to kiss her whenever they got a chance, and that she always used to box their ears whenever they did it. Now, I wonder," Violet continued, struck by a happy thought, " I wonder if it s because I didn t box your ears that they all object to it so ? Because if it is, you know, I might do it yet. Shall I ? " and she looked at him half in quiringly, half with a most bewitching sauci- ness. The comfort of telling her troubles to so sympathetic a listener was having a very reviving effect upon her. She certainly did not look at all like the most wretched girl in the world now. Rowney moved a little closer to her, they were sitting on the sofa, and took her hand in his. Then, rather shakily, he spoke : "Violet!" She started. He never had called her Violet before. But she did not take away her hand. " Violet!" Rowney s voice had not its usual mocking tone, but was quite grave and had a strange ring of tenderness in it. " My 222 COLOR STUDIES. little girl, there s just one way for me to get you out of the scrape that I ve got you into, and that s to marry you. May I ? " u O Rowney ! Do you mean to run away with me ? " " Well, I hadn t exactly contemplated running away with you, I confess," said Rowney, grinning a little in spite of him self. " Hadn t you, though ? " Violet answered, with a touch of disappointment. " Why, grandpapa ran away with grandmamma, and they had a lovely time. Colonel Smalt, that was grandmamma s father, you know, started right out after them with dogs and a shot-gun, and chased them for two whole days. And at last they came to a river that they had to swim their horses across, and the Colonel, who was close behind them, swam after them. And his horse was dead beat, and couldn t swim ; and the Colonel would have been drowned if grandpapa had not come back and rescued him. And the Colonel insisted upon fighting grandpapa ROBERSOWS MEDIUM. 22$ right there in the water, and he did cut him pretty badly ; and it was not until grand papa held him under water until he was nearly drowned that the Colonel gave in. And then grandpapa carried him safely ashore ; and after that, of course, they were the best of friends. Wasn t it all delight- ful ? I ve heard mamma say again and again, how much she was disappointed, because papa did not run away with her. So, don t you think, don t you really think, Rowney, that you d better run away with me, dear ?" "And have Mr. Mangan Brown, and Van, and Mr. Gamboge galloping after us, and swimming the Hudson, and peppering us with shot-guns ? " " Yes ! yes ! Oh, do do it, Rowney. It would be such splendid fun, and would be so very romantic ! " "All right. If you really want to run away, I d just as lief have things arranged that way as any other, and it certainly will save a lot of trouble. But don t count too 224 COLOR STUDIES. much on the shot-guns, for I don t think it probable that Mr. Mangan Brown and Mr. Gamboge will come out strong in that direc tion ; it isn t exactly their line. And now let me have a kiss ; just one, to make it a bargain, you know." And Madame d Antimoine coming in at this moment assumed an air of stately be nevolence, and said: " Ah, my children, is it thus ? Let me then give to you the bless ing, as is done by the good mamma in the play ! " MR. MANGAN BROWN did not adopt the shot-gun policy. Indeed, this policy was rendered quite impracticable by the fact that Rowney and Violet, immediately upon accomplishing their marriage, did their run ning away on board of Rowney s yacht a mode of departure that Violet approved of rapturously, because, as she said with much truth, " it was so like eloping with a real pirate. " But Mr. Mangan felt pretty dis mal over it, and wrote a very apologetic ROBERSON S MEDIUM. 22 5 account of his stewardship to Sefior Car mine. He tried to make the best of things, of course, pointing out that in the matters of family and fortune Rowney really was quite a desirable son-in-law ; but even after he had made the best of it, he could not help admitting to himself that the situation was one that a prudent parent scarcely could be expected very heartily to enjoy. And he was most agreeably surprised, therefore, a month or so later, when Sefior Carmine s letter escaped from the Mexican Post-Office, and came to him laden with olive-branches, instead of with the thunderbolts which he had feared. Violet s father was not angry ; on the con trary, he seemed to be highly pleased with the " excellent match " that his daughter had made, and expressed his unqualified ap proval of the " spirited way" in which she had made it. " She has done honor to her self, to her mother, and to the education that she has received," Sefior Carmine de clared, " and we are very grateful to you for 226 COLOR STUDIES. giving her the opportunity that she has so well improved." The letter concluded with a most urgent invitation for Mr. Mangan to come down for six months or a year, and to bring with him Mr. and Mrs. Gamboge, Van and Rose, Verona and young Orpiment, and Monsieur and Madame d Antimoine, with all of whom, this hospitable Mexican gentleman wrote, he had made a very pleas ant acquaintance in his daughter s letters. And enclosed in this communication was a note, signed, Brigida O Jara de Carmine, of which the theme was a breezy laudation of the love that defies conventionalities, and laughs at locksmiths, and is the true parent of romance ! "Well, since they take it this way," said Mr. Mangan Brown with a great sigh of re lief as he laid down the letters, " I must say that I m glad she s gone. At my time of life close association with such a such a very volcanic young woman as Violet is, is rather overwhelming. It s like being the Czar of Russia and having the leading Nihilist right ROBERSON S MEDIUM. 22*J in the house with you. And it is a great comfort, just when I thought that everything was ending shockingly, to find that every thing has ended pleasantly. For except that Violet has left that confounded parrot behind her everything has ended pleasantly, after all. And only Roberson, among those who had enjoyed the rather mixed pleasure of Miss Carmine s acquaintance during her sojourn in New York, dissented from the optimistic view of the situation thus formulated by Mr. Mangan Brown. In this matter Roberson was not optimistic: he was a pessimist of the deepest dye. When he came to know what a boomerang his revenge had turned out to be he forswore both love and spirit ualism and settled down to art with the stony calmness of despair. And it is a notable fact though a fact not unparalleled that the longer he painted the more abom inably bad his still-lifes were ! BRIEF LIST OF BOOKS OF FICTION PUBLISHED BY CHARLES SCRIBNEKS SONS George W. Cable. THE GRANDISSIMES. New edition. i2mo, . . $1.25 OLD CREOLE DAYS. New edition. i2mo, . . .1.25 The same in two parts. i6mo. Cloth, each, 750.; paper, each, 30 MADAME DELPHINE. i2mo, 75 Edward Eggleston. ROXY. A Tale of Indiana Life. Illustrated. I2mo, 1.50 THE CIRCUIT RIDER. A Tale. Illustrated. i2mo, 1.50 THE HOOSIER SCHOOLMASTER. Illustrated. i2mo, 1.25 THE MYSTERY OF METROPOLISVILLE. Illustrated. I2mo, i-5 THE END OF THE WORLD. A Love Story. Illustrated. i2mo, 1.5 Complete Sets (in box), 7- 2 S J. G. Holland. SEVENOAKS. Small I2mo, .25 THE BAY PATH. Small i2mo, .... .25 ARTHUR BONNICASTLE. Small i2mo, ... .25 Miss GILBERT S CAREER. Small i2mo, . . .25 NICHOLAS MINTURN. Small i2mo, ... .25 Frances Hodgson Burnett. THAT LASS o LOWRIE S. Illustrated. i2mo. Paper, 5oc.; cloth, ...;.... 1.50 HAWORTH S. Illustrated. i2mo, .... 1.50 LOUISIANA. i2mo, i.oo SURLY TIM and Other Stories. Small i2mo, . . 1.25 EARLIER STORIES. LINDSAY S LUCK. i6mo. Paper 30 PRETTY POLLY PEMBERTON. i6mo. Paper 40 KATHLEEN. i6mo. Paper, 40 THEO. i6mo. Paper, 30 Miss CRKSPIGNY. i6mo. Paper, 30 SCRIJ3NEKS LIST OF BOOKS OF FICTION. Frank R. Stockton. RUDDER GRANGE. i2mo. Paper, 60 cents ; cloth, $1.25 THE LADY OR THE TIGER? and Other Stories. i2mo. Paper, 50 cents ; cloth, i.oo George P. Lathrop. NEWPORT. i2mo. Paper, 500.; cloth, . . . 1.25 AN ECHO OF PASSION. i2mo. Paper, 5oc.; cloth, i.oo IN THE DISTANCE. i2mo. Paper, 5oc.; cloth, . i.oo Saxe Holm 1 s Stories. FIRST SERIES. " Draxy Miller s Dowry," " The Elder s Wife," " Whose Wife Was She ? " " The One-Legged Dancers," " How One Woman Kept Her Husband," " Esther Wynn s Love Letters." I2ino. Paper, 5oc.; cloth, . . i.oo SECOND SERIES. "A Four-Leaved Clover," " Farmer Bassett s Romance," " My Tourmaline," " Joe Hale s Red Stocking," "Su san Lawton s Escape." I2mo. Paper, 5oc.; cloth, i.oo H. H. Boyesen. FALCONBERG. Illustrated. I2mo, .... 1.50 GUNNAR. A Tale of Norse Life. Square I2mo, . 1.25 TALES FROM Two HEMISPHERES. Square i2mo, . i.oo ILKA ON THE HILL TOP, and Other Stories. Square i2mo, i.oo QUEEN TITANIA. Square i2mo, .... i.oo Edward Everett Hale. PHILIP NOLAN S FRIENDS. Illustrated. i2mo, . 1.75 Augustus M. Swift. CUPID, M.D. A Story. i6mo, . . . . i.oo LIST OF BOOKS OF FICTION. The King s Men. A Tale of To-morrow. By Robert Grant, John Boyle O Reilly, J. S. of Dale, and John T.Wheelwright. I2mo, $1.25 Virginia W. Johnson. THE FAINALLS OF TIPTON. i2mo, J - 2 5 Mrs. E. Prentiss. FRED, MARIA, AND ME. With illustrations. i2mo. New edition, J. S. of Dale. GUERNDALE. An Old Story. I2mo. Paper, 50 cents ; cloth, _ I<2 5 THE CRIME OF HENRY VANE. By the author of dale." I2mo, Mary Adams. AN HONORABLE SURRENDER. i6mo, . Count Leo Tolstoy. THE COSSACKS. i2mo, Donald G. Mitchell. DR, JOHNS. i2mo. New edition, . - J - 2 5 Julia Schayer. TIGER LILY and Other Stories. I2mo, . . i- Mary Mapes Dodge. THEOPHILUS AND OTHERS. i2mo, i-5 A. Perry. THE SCHOOLMASTER S TRIAL. i2mo, . i.oo H. C. Bunner and Brander Matthews. IN PARTNERSHIP. Studies in Story-Telling. i2mo, i.oo Across the Chasm. One vol. I2mo, SCRIJ3NE1TS LIST OF BOOKS OF FICTION. Howard Pyle. WITHIN THE CAPES. One vol. i2mo, . . . $1.00 E. T. W. Hoffmann. WEIRD TALES. 2 vols. i2mo. With portrait, 3.00 Erckmann- Chatrian Series. FRIEND FRITZ. i6mo, 1.25 THE CONSCRIPT. Illustrated. i6mo, . . . 1.25 WATERLOO. Illustrated. i2mo, .... 1.25 MADAME THERESE. Illustrated. i6mo, . . . 1.25 THE BLOCKADE OF PHALSBURG. Illustrated. i6mo, 1.25 THE INVASION OF FRANCE IN 1814. Illustrated. i6mo, 1.25 A MILLER S STORY OF THE WAR. i6mo, . . 1.25 Jules Verne. GODFREY MORGAN. Illustrated. 8vo, .... 2.00 MICHAEL STROGOFF. Illustrated. New edition. 8vo, . 2.00 A FLOATING CITY, and THE BLOCKADE RUNNERS. Illustrated. 8vo, 2.00 HECTOR SERVADAC. Illustrated. 8vo, .... 2.00 DICK SANDS. Illustrated. 8vo, 3- A JOURNEY TO THE CENTRE OF THE EARTH. Illustra ted. 8vo, 3- THE MYSTERIOUS ISLAND. Illustrated. 8vo, . . 3.00 FROM THE EARTH TO THE MOON DIRECT IN NINETY- SEVEN HOURS, TWENTY MINUTES. Illustrated. 12010, 1.50 STORIES OF ADVENTURE. Comprising " Meridiana," and "A Journey to the Centre of the Earth." Illus. I2mo, 1.50 THE DEMON OF CAWNPORE. (Part I of the Steam House). Illustrated. I2mo, .1.50 TIGERS AND TRAITORS. (Part II of the Steam House). Illustrated. I2mo, l -S EIGHT HUNDRED LEAGUES ON THE AMAZON. (Part I of the Giant Raft). Illustrated. I2mo. . 1-5 THE CRYPTOGRAM. (Part II of the Giant Raft). Illus trated. 121110, . . . * 5 SCRIJ3NER S LIST OF BOOKS OF FICTION. Stories by American Authors. A collection of the most noteworthy stories written in recent years, not hitherto printed in book form, now pub lished by arrangement with the authors. I WHO WAS SHE ? Bayard Taylor. THE DOCUMENTS IN THE CASE, Bran- der Matthews and H. C. Bunner. ONE OF THE THIRTY PIECES, William Henry Bishop. BALACCHI BROTHERS, Rebecca Harding Davis. 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Mitchell. YOUNG MOLL S PEEVY, C. A. Stephens. MANMAT HA, Charles de Kay. A DARING FICTION, H. H. Boyesen. THE STORY OF Two LIVES, Julia Schayer, ..... Complete Sets, 10 vols. in a box, $5.00. RETURN CIRCULATION DEPARTMENT TO ^ 202 Main Library LOAN PERIOD 1 HOME USE 2 3 4 5 6 ALL BOOKS MAY BE RECALLED AFTER 7 DAYS Renewals and Recharges may be made 4 days prior to the due date. Books may be Renewed by calling 642-3405 E AS STAMPED BELOW FORM NO. DD6 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY BERKELEY, CA 94720 LD 21-100m-2, 55 (B139s22)476 University of California Berkeley U. C. BERKELEY LIBRARIES THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY