Part 13

“Ugh!” shuddered Fisher. “That bath is filthy, and there’s never a drop of hot water, so one would be dirtier after taking a bath there.”

“Nonsense!” answered Bonnat. “All you have to do is to take down a pitcher or a bucket. Then rub soap all over your body, and stand up in the tub and pour the pitchers of cold water over and over yourself. It’s fine!”

“Whoor-roo!” shivered Enfield. “No cold water for me!”

Enfield was a thin-faced, sensitive-looking fellow, with eyes that lighted up unexpectedly, and who seemed to shrink up in his clothes, as if he were always cold. Menna had told me he was very talented, and could make big money at illustrations, but he drank all the time, not in a noisy way, but in a sad, quiet, secret way. He lived in a room somewhere on the East side in the tenement-house district. It was almost empty, except for an old stove, and Enfield would collect all the newspapers he could lay his hands on, and he slept on a pile of these, with another pile on top of him, and in bitter cold weather when he could not afford other fuel he burned his papers. He would roll them into tight logs and they would smoulder just like wood for hours, and give out a good heat even. His room was simply piled with old newspapers, said Menna. This man had come from extremely refined and wealthy people, but he chose to live in this dreadful way, so as to indulge his vice for liquor, and, it was suspected, drugs. At times he would brace up and do a decent piece of work, and then he would turn up, dressed immaculately, and the boys would be treated to the best of everything; but inside of a week he would spend every cent and pawn his clothes. I liked Enfield, though sometimes his cadaverous face frightened me. His hands always looked so thin and cold that I had a kind of maternal desire to take them in mine and warm them. There was something pathetically helpless about all these artists. They seemed all boys to me--even the older ones. I suppose it was that childish helplessness about them that appealed most to me.

They all chatted away, and gibed each other and joked as they worked, and they would tell stories, and then all stop work to laugh uproariously. Fisher told one about Enfield. He said that one evening the boys had a little spread in their rooms, beer and sausage and cheese, and for a joke they had put the remains of the sausage and cheese in the pocket of Enfield’s coat. Enfield caught up the story here and finished it thus:

“Some time later, I was starving.” He said that as if it were quite the usual thing to starve a bit. “I hadn’t eaten for two days, and all of a sudden I put my hand in that pocket, and found a sausage and some cheese. It surely saved my life.”

All of their stories were a curious mixture of tragedy and exquisite humor, and while I laughed one minute my eyes would fill up the next. I suppose, after all, that’s just how life is really compounded--of tragedy and comedy. It’s good to be able to feel both of these elements in our lives. A writer once referred to some of his characters as: “_dead_ people”--dead in the sense of simply being unable to grasp at any significance in life save the dull living from day to day. It seems to me one does not regret passing through scorching fires. It’s the only way one can get the big vision of life. I used to feel bitter, when I contemplated the easy life of other girls, and compared it with my own hard battle. Now I know that, had I to go through it all again, I would not exchange my hard experiences for the luxury that is the lot of others. I can even understand what it is to pity and not envy the rich. They _miss so much_. Money cannot buy that knowledge of humanity that comes only to him who has lived among the real people in the world--the poor!

All of which is what Bonnat would call “beside the question”--digression, that has “nothing to do with the thing, tra la!”

“Do you see that piece of drapery, Miss Ascough?” said Mr. Christain. “Well, Bonnat bought that yesterday at a little Jew shop on Third Avenue where they have several prices for everything. He asked: ‘What’s the price,’ and the Jew gave him the top-notch: ‘ninety-eight cent one yard,’ said he. ‘Ninety-eight cents!’ shouted that big chump there, ‘that’s dirt cheap! I’ll take it!’ He could have got it for fifteen, and when the Jew was wrapping it up, I could see by his face that he was sorry he hadn’t charged ninety-nine. Can you beat him for an easy mark?”

“Strikes me,” growled Bonnat, “we’re not particularly easy on Miss Ascough. She’s been posing over her time.”

“True enough,” said Fisher.

“Well, what’s the verdict?” demanded Bonnat, beaming down upon me. “Shall we have her next week, or get a nice little soft blonde in?”

I thought he was talking seriously, and I said:

“Oh, I hope you’ll have me. I like posing for you all.”

“You do?” said Bonnat, and then he added roughly: “It’s damned hard work, isn’t it?”

I said:

“Not with fellows like you. I forgot I was posing. I like to hear you all talk.”

They all laughed at that, and seemed much pleased. So then I was engaged to come again the following Sunday, to “hear them all talk.”

XLV

I had been posing for several Sundays for the “Club” in Paresis Row. At first, all four of the men came regularly. Then Enfield dropped out, then Christain, who was out of work, and finally one Sunday when I arrived I found only Bonnat there. He insisted that I should remain, as, he said, he was very much in need of a model.

He had been working away, without speaking once to me for some time. It was funny to watch his face while he worked, making curious facial expressions and attitudes corresponding to certain expressions and emotions. When he was through, I went over and looked at the painting, and I thought it was very wonderful. I said shyly:

“If you like, I’ll take it to some of the dealers I sell Mr. Menna’s paintings to, and Mr. Bonnat”-- I wanted him to know that I, too, could paint, but I had never the courage to tell him before all the other men--“I sometimes sell some of my own, too.”

He turned around slowly and looked at me.

“So you paint, too, do you?”

I nodded.

After a moment, he said:

“We won’t bother about those dealers you speak of, but I’d like to see your work.”

“I get ten dollars for a painting sometimes,” I said, thinking that would be an added inducement to him to let me help him sell his paintings. He smiled when I said that and after a moment he said:

“Ten dollars are a mighty comfortable thing, and so are two pairs of darned socks, as Oliver Twist would have said; but there’s something besides the selling question in all these efforts of ours--don’t you know that?”

“You mean self-expression?” I asked timidly. I had heard studio talk before.

“Yes--self-expression, and a good many other things besides.”

He paused, studying me musingly.

“I wonder if you will understand,” he said almost to himself, and then he added, with a beaming look: “Yes, I am sure you will. It’s this way: If our art is our life, then perhaps we had best follow Goethe’s advice and live resolutely in the good, the whole and the true. To do that we must know _values_--values on the canvas and values in life.”

Reggie’s scale of values flashed to my mind.

“To be well informed,” he went on, “generally helps us to recognize values.”

“The value of one’s paintings?” I asked slyly.

“I have an inclination to regard you as a little mouse,” he said, “but if you bite like that, I shall call you a flea instead. Yes, that value, and the value of money, too, by--hearsay.”

As he talked I had a sense of excitement, a certain uplifting thrill, as it were. It seemed to me he was opening the doors into a world that I had previously merely sensed. I knew dimly of its existence. The girls at Lil’s had said: “Well, what _do_ you want then?” I did not know myself. I think it was simply a blind, intuitive reaching after the light of understanding. I _felt_ these things, but I could not express my needs. I was of the inarticulate, but not the unfeeling. Bonnat must have realized this quality in me, else he would not have revealed himself so freely to me. He talked with an odd mixture of seriousness and lightness. It was almost as if he slowly chose his words, to make himself clear, just as if he were speaking to a child--a child he was not entirely sure of, but whom he wanted to reach.

“I do know what you mean,” I cried. “Do you know Kipling’s ‘L’Envoi?’--because that expresses it exactly.”

“Let’s hear it.”

And I recited warmly, for I loved it:

“When earth’s last picture is painted And the tubes are twisted and dry, When the oldest colors are faded, And the youngest critic has died, We shall rest, and, faith, we shall need it-- Lie down for an æon or two, Till the Master of all good workmen Shall set us to work anew. And those who are good shall be happy; They shall sit in a Golden Chair; They shall splash at a ten-league canvas With brushes of Comet’s hair; They shall find real saints to draw from-- Magdalene, Peter and Paul; They shall work for an age at a sitting, And never be tired at all; And only the Master shall praise us, And only the Master shall blame; And no one shall work for money, And no one shall work for Fame: But each for the joy of the working; And each in his separate star Shall draw the thing as he sees it For the God of Things as They are!”

“Bully!” cried Bonnat. “Your dramatic training was not lost. Only one thing--”

“What?”

He put his two hands on my shoulders, and gave me a friendly little shake and hug:

“You--lithp!” (lisp) he said.

Before I could protest at that deadly insult he took my hands and squeezed them hard, and he said:

“I believe we speak the same language after all. We _think_ it, anyway, don’t we?”

XLVI

I had been posing all afternoon. Bonnat still insisted on my coming each Sunday, although the other men were through with me for the time being. I was not sure that Bonnat could really afford to have a model alone, and I often thought I should not go; but somehow I found myself unable to keep away. All week long I looked forward to that afternoon in Paul Bonnat’s studio, and the thought that they could not last made me feel very badly.

“Look at the time!” He pointed dramatically to the clock on the shelf. It was upside down. Then he regarded me remorsefully:

“You must be tired out, and hungry, too. What do you say to having dinner with me to-night? How about one of those awful Italian table-d’hotes, where they give you ten courses with red ink for the price of a sandwich? Will that suit you?”

I was seized with a distaste to go out in the rain, even with Bonnat, to one those melancholy restaurants. I looked about me, and sighing, said:

“I wish I had a place to cook. I’m awfully tired of restaurants.”

“What, can you cook?” he demanded excitedly, just as if he had discovered some miraculous talent in me.

“Why, yes,” I said proudly. “And I love to, too. I can cook anything,” I added sweepingly.

“You don’t say.” His eyes swept the room. “Where’s that trunk?” He found it, and called to me to come and see what it contained.

“See here--how’s this? I brought these things with me when I first left home, and intended to cook for myself, but a fellow can’t bother with these things. Hasn’t got the time, and then everything gets lost about the place,” he added ruefully. “Now here’s a little gas stove. I use it to heat water for shaving, and sometimes when the boys come in on a cold night we make a hot drink.”

I had picked up a little brass kettle, and I saw him looking at it. He put his hands on the other side of it gently, and he said:

“That belonged to my mother. She’s been dead two years now.”

“Oh, we’ll not touch it,” I declared. “We’ll make coffee in something else.”

He pressed the little kettle upon me.

“No, no, you shall make it in this. My mother would have liked you to. I wish you could have known her.”

“I wish I could,” I said earnestly. Bonnat stared at me a moment, and then he said, moving toward the door:

“I’m going to the delicatessen, and I’ll bring back what?”

“Anything that is not cooked,” I said. “I do so want to cook a real dinner, and there’s a couple of pans here though I wish there was more than one gas thing.”

While he was gone I went quickly to work. I fairly flew about that studio, putting everything to rights, piling up the things in their proper places, hanging up the things that should be hung, and sweeping, tidying, dusting, till it really looked like a different place. Then I set the table with two plates I found in his trunk, one teaspoon, one knife and two forks. There was only one cup between us, but there were two glasses. Presently Bonnat came in with his arms full of packages. He stood in the doorway, just looking about him, and slowly over his face there came the most beautiful smile I have ever seen in the world. Somehow it just seemed to embrace the whole room, and me, too. He set the packages down, and this is what he had bought: Frankfurters, cheese, eggs, butter, bread, pickles, jam, and a lot of other things, but not a thing to cook except the frankfurters. I must have looked disappointed, for he asked anxiously:

“Isn’t it all right?”

“Oh, I had set my mind on making a rice pudding,” I said.

“That’s all right,” he declared eagerly. “You shall, too. What do you need for it?”

“Well, rice, cinnamon, sugar, milk, eggs and butter.”

He laughed, and went singing and rattling down the stairs on his second errand. I could hear him when he came back all the way from the entrance of the building; but I loved his noise!

I made that pudding. As we had no oven, I had to boil it, but I put cinnamon heavily on top, so it looked as if browned, and it did taste good. We were both so tired of the cheap restaurants that everything tasted just fine, and Bonnat leaned over the table and fervently declared that I was the best cook he had ever met in his life. We were both laughing about that, when after a rat-tat on the door, it burst open and in came Fisher. He stopped short and stared at us.

“Well, upon my word, you look like newly-weds,” he said, and that made me blush so that I pretended to drop something and leaned over to pick it up, for I was ashamed to look at Paul Bonnat after that.

“My, but it smells good,” said Fisher. “Got a bite for another beggar, Miss Ascough?” Then his eye went slowly and amazedly about the room, and he exclaimed: “Gee whiz! Have the fairies been to work? Well, you certainly look cozy now.”

He drew up a chair, and went to work on the remnants of our feast, talking constantly as he ate.

“Say, Miss Ascough, we fellows can have lots of spreads like this, now that we know you can cook.”

“What do you take her for?” growled Bonnat. “Do you think the whole hungry bunch of you are going to have her cooking for you? Not on your life, you’re not.”

Fisher laughed.

“By the way, there’s a bunch of us going down to the Bowery to-morrow night. We’ll get chop suey at a pretty good joint there, and then we’re going to Atlantic Garden where we can get those big steins of beer. Why don’t you bring Miss Ascough along?”

Bonnat leaned over the table and asked:

“_Will_ you go with me?” just as if I would be conferring a great favor on him, and I said that I would. After that I was included in all their little trips, and sometimes I would try to pretend I was a boy, too; only there was Paul, and somehow when I looked at Paul, I was glad I was a girl.

XLVII

I was helping Menna that day. He had been very busy, and I had been working for him both mornings and afternoons. He had told me, however, that soon he expected to “pick up and go West,” and I was troubled about that. I depended upon Menna for most of my work, and we got along splendidly together. As I have said, Menna had always treated me just like a “fellow” as he would call it.

There was a knock at the door, and in came Paul Bonnat. After nodding to Menna, he strolled over to where I was working and stood at the back of me, watching me paint.

“She’s quite a painter,” he said after a moment to Menna, who looked up and nodded, and said:

“Yes, she does quite O. K.”

After a while Menna turned around on his stool and asked:

“Got anything on to-night, Bonnat?”

“No--nothing particular.”

“Well, a lady friend of mine is coming in from Staten Island, and I promised to take her somewhere to supper and see the town. Can’t you and Miss Ascough join us?”

Bonnat beamed, just as if Menna had handed him a gift, and he said:

“Sure, if Miss Ascough will go with me.”

I said that I would. I think I would have gone with him anywhere he asked me to.

“Meet us here at seven, then,” said Menna, returning to his work.

“All right. Good-bye.” Bonnat went out, slamming the door noisily behind him. We could hear him singing the “Preislied” from “Meistersinger” as he went up the stairs. He had a big, wonderful baritone voice. We stopped painting to listen to him, but when I turned to resume my work, I found Menna watching me. He said:

“You and Bonnat are getting pretty friendly, eh?”

I felt myself color warmly, but I tried to laugh, and said:

“Oh, no more than I am with any of the other boys.”

Menna had his thumb through his palette, and he stared at me hard. Then he said suddenly:

“Gee! What a fool I was to let him get ahead of me.”

He set down his palette, and came over to my stool:

“Say, Marion” (he had never called me Marion

before), “you and I would make a corking good team. Suppose we pair off together to-night, and we’ll put Miss Fleming on to Bonnat? What do you say?”

“Mr. Menna, you had better stick to your own girl,” I said, feeling uneasy. Menna continued to stare down at me and as he said nothing to that, I added:

“You know you and I are just partners in our work, and don’t let’s fool. It’ll spoil everything.”

“Oh, all right,” said he, “I don’t have to get down on my knees to you or any other girl.”

He had never spoken to me like that before. Until this day, he had never asked me to go anywhere with him, nor tried to see me after work hours, and I did not suppose he was the least bit interested in me, and I supposed he was quite settled with his own sweetheart. I was so glad when Miss Fleming knocked on the door.

That evening we all went to Shefftel Hall. It was one of the oldest places in New York, and was interesting because of the class of people who patronized the place and its resemblance to the German gardens, which it was in fact itself. There were German ornaments and steins all around the place on a high shelf. There was an excellent orchestra which played good selections and Bonnat hummed when they played some of his favorites. Menna and Bonnat seemed to differ on almost every subject, and Menna seemed in a savagely contrary mood that night.

Bonnat would explain his point of view about something, and Menna would say irritably:

“Yes, yes, but what’s the use?”

Bonnat said that a man should show in his work the human mood, and that a picture should mean something more than a pretty melody of colors. Menna interrupted him with:

“What’s the use, as long as we get good Pilsener beer?”

Paul laughed at that, and called to a waiter to bring some more Pilsener for Menna right away. After the dinner was over, Mr. Menna took Miss Fleming home, and Paul and I walked up Fourteenth Street, stopping to look in the windows, and to glance at the curious people in the throngs that passed us. Fourteenth Street was then a very gay and bedizened place at night.

When we reached my door, Paul, who had been very silent, took my hand and held it for some time, without saying a word. I could feel his eyes looking down on me in the darkness of the street, and somehow the very clasp of his hand seemed to be speaking to me, telling me things that made me feel warm, and, oh! so happy. When he did speak at last, his big voice was curiously repressed, and he said huskily:

“I think I know now why some men give up art for the sake of protecting their _own_!” He said “own” with such strange emphasis, pressing my hand as he said it, that I felt too moved to answer him, and I had a great longing to put my arms around him and draw his head down to mine.

After that night Mr. Menna did not seem the same to me. All the little kindnesses I had been accustomed to receive from him, such as cleaning my palette, my brushes, and nailing my canvases on the stretchers, he now let me do myself, and once when I asked him to varnish a painting of mine, he answered:

“Why don’t you get that Bonnat to do it for you?”

XLVIII

“DEAR MARION:

Mr. Hirsh is going to put on the living pictures in Providence for two weeks, and he says he would like to take the same girls that he had before, and told me to tell you that he will pay twenty dollars a week. Also that he will take us to Boston and some other places if we do well in Providence.

Why don’t you come and see us to-night? and bring along the fellow Hatty said she saw you walking with on Fourteenth St. How are you anyway?--I’m leaving for Providence to-morrow. With love,

LIL.”

I had been thinking of Lil’s letter all day, but I could not make up my mind how to answer it. The thought of making forty dollars in two weeks appealed to me very much, for we were not very busy now, and Menna expected to go West very soon. On account of my work with Menna I had not done much posing in New York, but I intended to call on some artists and see about engagements when Menna should go. Forty dollars was a lot of money to me, and it would take me many weeks to earn that much in posing. It did seem as if I simply could not refuse this chance. But my mind kept turning to Paul Bonnat. I could think of nobody else but him. He had made my life worth while. I thought of all the happy times we had together. He did not have much money to spend on me, and he could not take me to expensive places like Reggie used to, but he lived as I did, and we enjoyed the same things--things that Reggie would have called silly and cheap. We went to the exhibitions of the artists, long walks in the park, to the Metropolitan Museum, and, best of all, to the opera. That was the one thing Paul would be extravagant about, although our seats were in the top gallery of the family circle. I would be out of breath by the time I climbed up there, but I learned to appreciate and love the best only in music, just as Paul was teaching me to understand the best in all art.

There, I listened with mingled feelings and enjoyment to the operas of Wagner. His “Tristan und Isolde” rang in my ears for days, and by the time I heard “Die Meistersinger,” I was able thoroughly to enjoy what before had been unknown land to me. We Canadians had never gone much beyond a little of Mendelssohn, which the teachers of music seemed to consider the height of classical music, and the people were still singing the old sentimental songs, not the ragtime the Americans love, but the deadly sweet melodies that cloy and teach us nothing. Of course, no doubt, things have changed there now; but it was that way when I was a girl in Montreal.