"Yes, really! You were just at the right angle for it, and you did look so hopeful!"

"You can't make me believe you played such a shabby trick upon me, Mary Downing!"

"Shabby! If you knew how good-looking you were at a three-eighths'

angle you would be grateful to me! You did have such an inspired look for a little while,--before you got disgusted, and began to wash out."

"Jane Rhoades did an awfully pretty thing--a white bird with a boy running after it. But I felt perfectly certain that the little wretch had a gun in his other hand!"

"What a fiery head you gave your angel, Mattie Stiles! He looked like Loge in _Rheingold!_"

"I don't care," said Mattie, in a tone of voice that showed that she did care very much indeed. "I do like red hair, and we haven't had a chance to paint any all winter."

"Red hair wouldn't make t.i.tians of us," sighed Miss Isabella Ricker, who was of a despondent temperament.

"It wouldn't be any hindrance, anyhow!" Mattie insisted.

Meanwhile the half-hour was drawing to a close. A general air of rough order had descended upon the studio. The girls were sitting or standing about in groups, their remarks getting more disjointed and irrelevant as the nervousness of antic.i.p.ation grew upon them. Madge and Eleanor had found a seat on the steps of the platform. The former was making a pencil sketch of Miss Isabella Ricker, who had abandoned herself to dejection in a remote corner of the room. Madge looked up suddenly, and found that Eleanor was watching her work.

"Your thing is very interesting," she remarked, in a reserved tone, which, nevertheless, sent the colour mounting slowly up her friend's sensitive cheek. They both understood that no more commendatory adjective than "interesting" was to be found in the art-student's vocabulary.

"You're partial, Madge."

"Not a bit of it. But I know an interesting thing when I see it. If you win the prize," she asked abruptly, "what shall you do with the money?"

"If you go to the moon next week, what shall you do with the green cheese?" Eleanor retorted, with an unprecedented outburst of sarcasm.

"I think you might answer my question," said Madge; and at that instant the door opened and a hush fell upon the room.

The suspense was not painfully prolonged. The Curator of the Art Museum, who had been a.s.sociated with Mrs. Jacques and Mr. Salome as judge, stepped upon the platform, from which Madge and Eleanor had precipitately retreated, and made the following announcement:

"We have, on the whole," he said, "been very well pleased with the work we have had to consider. In fact, several of the sketches were better than anything we had looked for. Nevertheless our decision was not a difficult one, and our choice is unanimous. The prize which Mrs.

Jacques has had the originality and the generosity to offer has been awarded to Mary Eleanor Merritt."

"And now will you answer my question?"

Madge and Eleanor were walking home together through the light snow which had just begun to fall. They had been curiously shy of speaking, and, before the silence was broken, a pretty wreath of snow had formed itself about the rim of each of their black felt hats, while little ribbons of it were decorating the folds of their garments.

"What are you going to do with your green cheese?"

"I shall go to Paris next autumn," said Eleanor, tightly clasping the check which she held inside her m.u.f.f.

"That's what I thought," said Madge; and if her eyes grew a trifle red and moist it was perhaps natural enough, since the snow was flying straight into them.

CHAPTER II

THE MINIATURE

"What makes you keep looking at me, Eleanor Merritt? You're not a bit of a good model!"

Thus reproved, Eleanor once more fixed her eyes upon a very bad oil-portrait of Great-grandfather Burtwell, an elderly man of a wooden countenance, in stock and choker, surmounting an expanse of black broadcloth which occupied two-thirds of the canvas.

The girls were established in what was known as the spare-room of the Burtwell house, which, with its north light and usual freedom from visitors made a very good studio. Madge was painting a miniature of Eleanor. The diminutive size of her undertaking was causing her a good deal of embarra.s.sment, and she was consequently inclined to be rather severe with her sitter.

"You know I am not going to have many more chances of looking at you for a year to come," Eleanor urged, in a tone of meek dejection.

"And I can't see you, even now," Madge persisted, "if you don't turn more toward the light."

There was silence again for some minutes, while Madge painted steadily on. Difficult as was this new task which she had set herself, she was captivated with it. However the miniature might turn out as a likeness, she felt sure that each stroke of her brush was making a prettier picture of it. The eyes already had the real Eleanor look, and the hair was "pretty nice." The mouth was troublesome, to be sure, and to-day she did not feel inspired to improve it, and had turned her attention to less important details.

"You've got such a pretty ear!" she remarked presently, as she touched its outermost rim with a hair line, c.o.c.king her head to one side, the while, in a very professional manner; "Did you ever notice what a pretty ear you have?"

"Better be careful how you talk about it," Eleanor laughed, "for fear it should begin to burn!"

The artist looked in some trepidation at the feature in question, but its soft hue did not deepen. She took the precaution, however, to change the subject; to one which she often chose, indeed, for the sake of the animation it brought into the pretty face of her model.

Eleanor's "repose" sometimes bothered her.

"What shall you do the first day in Paris?" Madge asked.

"I shall write to you."

"Good gracious! You won't write to me before you have seen the Louvre!"

"I shall write to you the very first minute. And then I shall write again that same evening, and tell you whether there really is a Louvre! If there shouldn't be one, you know, I shouldn't feel so like a pig in being there without you!"

"You needn't feel like a pig, as far as that goes," said Madge. "I couldn't have gone to Paris if I had won the prize."

"Why not?"

"Well, I had it out with Father this morning. He says it's not a mere matter of money; that if he and Mother thought well of my going, they could manage it."

"O Madge! Can't you make them think well of it?"

"I'm afraid not. Father never did really believe in my going in for art, and I think he believes in it less now than he ever did. He says I've been at it for three years, and I haven't painted a pretty picture yet. And he says he doesn't see what good it's going to do me in after-life; that if I marry I sha'n't keep it up, and there wouldn't be any good in my trying to;--which is, of course a mistake, only I can't make him believe that it is,--and he says that if I don't marry, I've got to earn my living sooner or later."

"Why, but that's just it, Madge! You're going to be able to earn your living! You're sure to!"

But Madge was again engrossed in her work. The afternoon would soon draw to a close, and if she wished to carry out her designs upon that ear it behooved her to stop talking. Though her little picture was an oval of three inches by four, it had cost her more strokes than any canvas of ten times the size had ever done. And Eleanor was to sail in a fortnight!

At last the light began to fade, and Madge knew that she must stop.

"What do you suppose Father said to me this morning?" she asked, as she washed out her brushes and put her paint-box in order.

"I can't imagine."