'No.'
'Kelly green?'
'Theo,' said Mrs. Boatright wamingly.
'Am I showing off, Mary Anne?' The painter grinned.
'Yes,' said Mrs. Boatright.
'Well then, truce to that.' The painter shrugged. 'Well then, gray green?'
'Y-yes,' said Mr. Gibson, struggling. 'Palish, dullish . . .'
'In other words, paper-bag green,' said the painter, amiably. 'Of course.' He rambled to the left and stopped still and looked blind. 'I sat on the left side of the bus,' he said dreamily. 'For the first ten minutes I examined a hat. What blossoms! Watermelon shade. Nine petals, which is W7Zlikely. Well, to proceed. I saw you . . . the man there with the good eyes. That can't tell one green from another.'
'Me?' squeaked Mr. Gibson.
'A man of sorrows, thought I,' the painter continued. 'Oh yes, you did have in your left hand a gray-green paper bag.'
Mr. Gibson began to tremble.
'I watched you a while. How I envied you your youth and your sorrow! I said to myself, this man is really liv- ing!'
Mr. Gibson thought one of them must have gone mad!
The artist's eyes sHd under half-drawn lids. 'I saw you put the paper bag down on the seat.' The eyes were nearly closed now, and yet watched. 'You took a small black-covered notebook out of your pocket . . .'
'I . . . did?'
'You produced a gold ball-point pen, about five inches long, and you wrote—brooded—wrote . . .'
'I did!' Mr. Gibson began to feel all his pockets.
'Then you got to brooding so bad you forgot to write. I lost interest. Nothing more to see, you know. Besides, I discovered an ear without a lobe, two seats ahead of me.
Rosemary had jumped up. She stood over Mr. Gibson as he drew his little pocket notebook out and flipped the pages. Yes, pen marks. He looked at what he had written on the bus. 'Rosemary . . . Rosemary . . , Rosemary.' Nothing but her name three times. That was all.
'Trying ... a letter to you,' he stammered, and looked
up.
Rosemary's eyes were enigmatic . . . perhaps sad. She shook her head slightly, walked slowly back to the couch and sat down. Lavinia changed her feet, and put the top one underneath.
'I saw you, Mary Anne,' the painter said, 'and pretended not. I lay low. Forgive me, but I didn't want to be snared and exhibited.'
'I saw you, you know.' said Mrs. Boatright calmly, 'or we wouldn't be here. Had nowhere to exhibit you, profitably, at the moment.'
'You lay low?' The painter sighed. 'Ships in the night. I am a vain man, amn't I? Well, let's see. Let's see.
'The paper bag?' pressed Rosemary.
'Quiet, now,' the painter's eyes roved. 'Ah yes, the heart-shaped face. Saw you.'
'Me?' said Virginia.
'On the right side, well forward?'
'Yes.'
'Where you could turn those gentle eyes where you liked,' said the painter, mischievously.
Virginia's face turned a deep soft pink. Lee Coffey's ears stood up.
'I didn't try to see whether he was looking sly at you. Perhaps in the mirror?' said the painter and swung to the driver. ''Were you?'
'Me!' exploded Lee, and then softly, 'Me?'
'Theo,' said Mrs. Boatright severely, 'you are showing off again. And behaving like a bad little boy.'
'I don't care to have her embarrassed,' said the bus driver stiffly. 'Got on to the subject, the poison.'
The painter flapped both hands. 'Don't mind me,' he said irritably. 'I see things. I can't help it.' (The bus driver picked up the nurse's hand in his, although neither of them seemed aware of this or looked at each other.) The painter clasped his hands behind him and arched his thin ribcase and teetered on his toes. 'There was that ear ...'
''Whose ear?' demanded Rosemary fiercely.
'Can't say. All I noticed was the ear. We could advertise. Wait a minute . . . Didn't Mary Anne say your name is Gibson?'
'Yes.'
'Then somebody spoke to you.'
