'Keep your seats, I'm not coming in. I just wanted to ask, who is it that's painting down there?'
'That? Oh, that's a young artist; young Englishman, named Tracy; very promising—favorite pupil of Hans Christian Andersen or one of the other old masters—Andersen I'm pretty sure it is; he's going to half-sole some of our old Italian masterpieces. Been talking to him?'
'Well, only a word. I stumbled right in on him without expecting anybody was there. I tried to be polite to him; offered him a snack'—(Sellers delivered a large wink to Hawkins from behind his hand), 'but he declined, and said he wasn't hungry' (another sarcastic wink); 'so I brought some apples' (doublewink), 'and he ate a couple of—'
'What!' and the colonel sprang some yards toward the ceiling and came down quaking with astonishment.
Lady Rossmore was smitten dumb with amazement. She gazed at the sheepish relic of Cherokee Strip, then at her husband, and then at the guest again. Finally she said:
'What is the matter with you, Mulberry?'
He did not answer immediately. His back was turned; he was bending over his chair, feeling the seat of it. But he answered next moment, and said:
'Ah, there it is; it was a tack.'
The lady contemplated him doubtfully a moment, then said, pretty snappishly:
'All that for a tack! Praise goodness it wasn't a shingle nail, it would have landed you in the Milky Way. I do hate to have my nerves shook up so.' And she turned on her heel and went her way.
As soon as she was safely out, the Colonel said, in a suppressed voice:
'Come—we must see for ourselves. It must be a mistake.'
They hurried softly down and peeped in. Sellers whispered, in a sort of despair—
It is eating! What a grisly spectacle! Hawkins it's horrible! Take me away—I can't stand—
They tottered back to the laboratory.
CHAPTER XX.
Tracy's perplexities with regard to the Claimant's sanity—The Claimant interviews him—Sally Sellers meets Tracy —A violent case of love at first sight—Pinks
Tracy made slow progress with his work, for his mind wandered a good deal. Many things were puzzling him. Finally a light burst upon him all of a sudden—seemed to, at any rate—and he said to himself, 'I've got the clew at last—this man's mind is off its balance; I don't know how much, but it's off a point or two, sure; off enough to explain this mess of perplexities, anyway. These dreadful chromos which he takes for old masters; these villainous portraits—which to his frantic mind represent Rossmores; the hatchments; the pompous name of this ramshackle old crib—Rossmore Towers; and that odd assertion of his, that I was expected. How could I be expected? that is, Lord Berkeley. He knows by the papers that that person was burned up in the New Gadsby. Why, hang it, he really doesn't know who he was expecting; for his talk showed that he was not expecting an Englishman, or yet an artist, yet I answer his requirements notwithstanding. He seems sufficiently satisfied with me. Yes, he is a little off; in fact I am afraid he is a good deal off, poor old gentleman. But he's interesting—all people in about his condition are, I suppose. I hope he'll like my work; I would like to come every day and study him. And when I write my father—ah, that hurts! I mustn't get on that subject; it isn't good for my spirits. Somebody coming—I must get to work. It's the old gentleman again. He looks bothered. Maybe my clothes are suspicious; and they are—for an artist. If my conscience would allow me to make a change, but that is out of the question. I wonder what he's making those passes in the air for, with his hands. I seem to be the object of them. Can he be trying to mesmerize me? I don't quite like it. There's something uncanny about it.'
The colonel muttered to himself, 'It has an effect on him, I can see it myself. That's enough for one time, I reckon. He's not very solid, yet, I suppose, and I might disintegrate him. I'll just put a sly question or two at him, now, and see if I can find out what his condition is, and where he's from.'
He approached and said affably:
'Don't let me disturb you, Mr. Tracy; I only want to take a little glimpse of your work. Ah, that's fine—that's very fine indeed. You are doing it elegantly. My daughter will be charmed with this. May I sit down by you?'
'Oh, do; I shall be glad.'
'It won't disturb you? I mean, won't dissipate your inspirations?'
Tracy laughed and said they were not ethereal enough to be very easily discommoded.
The colonel asked a number of cautious and well-considered questions—questions which seemed pretty odd and flighty to Tracy—but the answers conveyed the information desired, apparently, for the colonel said to himself, with mixed pride and gratification:
'It's a good job as far as I've got, with it. He's solid. Solid and going to last, solid as the real thing.'
'It's wonderful—wonderful. I believe I could—petrify him.' After a little he asked, warily 'Do you prefer being here, or—or there?'
'There? Where?'
'Why—er—where you've been?'
Tracy's thought flew to his boarding-house, and he answered with decision.
'Oh, here, much!'
The colonel was startled, and said to himself, 'There's no uncertain ring about that. It indicates where he's been to, poor fellow. Well, I am satisfied, now. I'm glad I got him out.'
He sat thinking, and thinking, and watching the brush go. At length he said to himself, 'Yes, it certainly seems to account for the failure of my endeavors in poor Berkeley's case. He went in the other direction. Well, it's all right. He's better off.'
Sally Sellers entered from the street, now, looking her divinest, and the artist was introduced to her. It was a violent case of mutual love at first sight, though neither party was entirely aware of the fact, perhaps. The Englishman made this irrelevant remark to himself, 'Perhaps he is not insane, after all.' Sally sat down, and showed an interest in Tracy's work which greatly pleased him, and a benevolent forgiveness of it which convinced him that the girl's nature was cast in a large mould. Sellers was anxious to report his discoveries to Hawkins; so he took his leave, saying that if the two 'young devotees of the colored Muse' thought they could manage without him, he would go and look after his affairs. The artist said to himself, 'I think he is a little eccentric, perhaps, but that is all.' He reproached himself for having injuriously judged a man without giving him any fair chance to show what he really was.
Of course the stranger was very soon at his ease and chatting along comfortably. The average American girl possesses the valuable qualities of naturalness, honesty, and inoffensive straightforwardness; she is nearly barren of troublesome conventions and artificialities, consequently her presence and her ways are unembarrassing, and one is acquainted with her and on the pleasantest terms with her before he knows how it came about. This new acquaintanceship—friendship, indeed—progressed swiftly; and the unusual swiftness of it, and the thoroughness of it are sufficiently evidenced and established by one noteworthy fact—that within the first half hour both parties had ceased to be conscious of Tracy's clothes. Later this consciousness was re-awakened; it was then apparent to Gwendolen that she was almost reconciled to them, and it was apparent to Tracy that he wasn't. The re-awakening was brought about by Gwendolen's inviting the artist to stay to dinner. He had to decline, because he wanted to live, now—that is, now that there was something to live for—and he could not survive in those clothes at a gentleman's table. He thought he knew that. But he went away happy, for he saw that Gwendolen was disappointed.
And whither did he go? He went straight to a slopshop and bought as neat and reasonably well-fitting a suit of clothes as an Englishman could be persuaded to wear. He said—to himself, but at his conscience—'I know it's wrong; but it would be wrong not to do it; and two wrongs do not make a right.'
This satisfied him, and made his heart light. Perhaps it will also satisfy the reader—if he can make out what it means.
The old people were troubled about Gwendolen at dinner, because she was so distraught and silent. If they
