Between Friends | Page 5

to her that this day
had not been a sample of their usual humdrum relations. From the very

beginning of their business relations he had remained merely her
employer, self-centered, darkly absorbed in his work, or, when not
working, bored and often yawning. She had never come to know him
any better than when she first laid eyes on him.
Always she had been a little interested in him, a little afraid, sometimes
venturing an innocent audacity, out of sheer curiosity concerning the
effect on him. But never had she succeeded in stirring him to any
expression of personal feeling in regard to herself, one way or the
other.
Probably he had no personal feeling concerning her. It seemed odd to
her; model and master thrown alone together, day after day, usually
became friends in some degree. But there had been nothing at all of
camaraderie in their relationship, only a colorless, professional
sans-gene, the informality of intimacy without the kindly essence of
personal interest on his part.
He paid her wages promptly; said good morning when she came, and
good night when she went; answered her questions when she asked
them seriously; relapsed into indifference or into a lazy and not too
civil badinage when she provoked him to it; and that was all.
He never complimented her, never praised her; yet he must have
thought her a good model, or he would not have continued to send for
her.
"Do you think me pretty?" she had asked one day, saucily invading one
of his yawning silences.
"I think you're pretty good," he replied, "as a model. You'd be quite
perfect if you were also deaf and dumb."
That had been nearly a year ago. She thought of it now, a slight heat in
her cheeks as she remembered the snub, and her almost childish
amazement, and the hurt and offended silence which lasted all that
morning, but which, if he noticed at all, was doubtless entirely
gratifying to him.

"May I rest?"
"If it's necessary."
She sprang lightly to the floor walked around behind him, and stood
looking at his work.
"Do you want to know my opinion?" she asked.
"Yes," he said, with unexpected urbanity; "if you are clever enough to
have an opinion. What is it?"
She said, looking at the wax figure of herself and speaking with
deliberation:
"In the last hour you have made out of a rather commonplace study an
entirely spontaneous and charming creation."
"What!" he exclaimed, his face reddening with pleasure at her opinion,
and with surprise at her mode of expressing it.
"It's quite true. That dancing figure is wholly charming. It is no study; it
is pure creation."
He knew it; was a little thrilled that she, representing to him an average
and mediocre public, should recognize it so intelligently.
"As though," she continued, "you had laid aside childish things."
"What?" he asked, surprised again at the authority of the expression.
"Academic precision and the respectable excellencies
of-the-usual;--you have put away childish things and become a man."
"Where did you hear that?" he said bluntly.
"I heard it when I said it. You know, Mr. Drene, I am not wholly
uneducated, although your amiable question insinuates as much."

"I'm not unamiable. Only I didn't suppose--"
"Oh, you never have supposed anything concerning me. So why are
you surprised when I express myself with fragmentary intelligence?"
"I'm sorry--"
"Listen to me. I'm not afraid of you any more. I've been afraid for two
years. Now, I'm not. Your study is masterly. I know it. You know it.
You didn't know I knew it; you didn't know I knew anything. And you
didn't care."
She sat down on the sofa, facing him with a breathless smile.
"You don't care what I think, what I am, what interests I may have,
what intellect, what of human desire, hope, fear, ambition animates me;
do you? You don't care whether I am ignorant or educated, bad or good,
ill or well--as long as it does not affect my posing for you; whether I
am happy or unhappy, whether I--"
"For Heaven's sake--"
"But you don't care! . . . Do you?"
He was silent; he stood looking at her in a stupid sort of way.
After a moment or two she rose, picked up her hat, went to the glass
and pinned it on, then strolled slowly back, drawing on her gloves.
"It's five o'clock, you know, Drene."
"Yes, certainly."
"Do you want me to-morrow?"
"Yes. Yes, of course."
"You are not offended?"

He did not answer. She came up to him and repeated the question in a
childishly anxious voice that was a trifle too humble. And looking
down into her eyes he saw a gleam of pure mischief in them.
"You little villain!" he said; and