Part 36 (1/2)

”You lovely creature, here I am at last! Theodore hadn't been up for a week, so I came down, to find Mr. Gunther thundering like Odin because I had promised to help him arrange sittings with you, and had forgotten it. I had to bring him at once. He says his group is all done but the two heads, and he must have yours and the baby's. But he'll tell you all about it. Where is he? Elliston, I mean. I've brought him some short frocks. Where are they, Mr. Gunther? If he's put them in his pockets, he'll never find them--they are feet long--the pockets, I mean. Bless you, Mary Byrd, how good it is to see you! Come into the house, every one, and let me rest.”

Mary was bubbling with laughter.

”Constance, you human dynamo, we'll go in by all means, and hold our breaths listening to your 'resting'!”

”Don't sa.s.s your elders, naughty girl. Oh, my heavens, I've been five months in New England, and have behaved like a perfect gentlewoman all the time! Now I'm due for an attack of New Yorkitis!” Constance rushed into the sitting room, pulled off her hat and patted her hair into shape, ran to the kitchen door to say h.e.l.lo to Lily, and was back in her chair by the time the others had found theirs. Her quick glance traveled from one to the other.

”Now I shall listen,” she said. ”Mary, tell your news. Mr. Gunther, explain your ideas.”

Mary laughed again. ”Visitors first,” she nodded to the Norwegian who, as always, was staring at her with a perfectly civil fixity.

He placed a great hand on either knee and prepared to state his case.

With his red-gold beard and piercing eyes, he was, Mary thought, quite the handsomest, and, after Stefan, the most attractive man she had ever seen.

”Mrs. Byrd,” he began, ”I am doing, among other things, a large group called 'Pioneers' for the Frisco exhibition. It is finished in the clay--as Mrs. Elliot said--all but two heads, and is already roughly blocked in marble. I want your head, with your son's--I must have them.

Six sittings will be enough. If you cannot, as I imagine, come to the city, I will bring my clay here, and we will work in your husband's studio. These figures, of whom the man is modeled from myself, do not represent pioneers in the ordinary sense. They embody my idea of those who will lead the race to future greatness. That is why I feel it essential to have you as a model.”

He spoke quite simply, without a trace of flattery, as if he were merely putting into words a self-evident truth. A compliment of such staggering dimensions, however, left Mary abashed.

”You may wonder,” he went on, seeing her silent, ”why I so regard you.

It is not merely your beauty, Mrs. Byrd, of which as an artist I can speak without offense, it is because to my mind you combine strong mentality and morale with simplicity of temperament. You are an Apollonian, rather than a Dionysian. Of such, in my judgment, will the super-race be made.” Gunther folded his arms and leaned back.

He was sufficiently distinguished to be able to carry off a p.r.o.nouncement which in a lesser man would have been an impertinence, and he knew it.

Constance threw up her hands. ”There, Mary, your niche is carved. I don't quite know what Mr. Gunther means, but he sounds right.”

Mary found her voice. ”Mr. Gunther honors me very much, and, although of course I do not deserve his praise, I shall certainly not refuse his request.”

Gunther bowed gravely from the hips in the Continental manner, without rising.

”When may I come,” he asked; ”to-morrow? Good! I will bring the clay out by auto.”

”You lucky woman,” exclaimed Constance. ”To think of being immortalized by two great artists in one year!”

”Her type is very rare,” said Gunther in explanation. ”When does one see the cla.s.sic face with expression added? Almost always, it is dull.”

”Now, Mary, produce the infant!” Constance did not intend the whole morning to be devoted to the Olympian discourse of the sculptor.

The baby was brought down, and the rest of the visit pivoted about him. Mary glowed at the praises he received; she looked immeasurably brighter, Constance thought, than when they arrived.

On the way home Gunther unbosomed himself of a final p.r.o.nouncement. ”She does not look too happy, but her beauty is richer and its meaning deeper than before. She is what the mothers of men should be. I am sorry,” he concluded simply, ”that I did not meet her more than a year ago.”

Constance almost gasped. What an advantage, she thought, great physical gifts bring. Even without this man's distinction in his art, it was obvious that he had some right to a.s.sume his ability to mate with whomever he might choose.

Early the next morning the sculptor drove up to the barn, his tonneau loaded with impedimenta. Mary was ready for him, and watched with interest while he lifted out first a great wooden box of clay, then a small model throne, then two turntables, and finally, two tin buckets.

These baffled her, till, having installed the clay-box, which she doubted if an ordinary man could lift, he made for the garden pump and watered his clay with the contents of the buckets.