Fenwicks Career | Page 4

quiet, Bella; you disturb me.'
Bella's chin mounted still higher; her foot once more beat the ground
impatiently, while her father looked from the picture to her, and back
again.
Then he released her with a laugh. 'You may run away, child, if you
want to. Upon my word, Fenwick, you're advancing! You are: no doubt
about that. Some of the execution there is astonishing. But all the same
I don't see you earning your bread-and-butter at portrait-painting; and I
guess you don't either.'
The speaker threw out a thin hand and patted Fenwick on the shoulder,
returning immediately to a close examination of the picture.
'I told you, sir, I should only paint portraits if I were compelled!' said
the young man, in a proud, muffled voice. He began to gather up his

things and clean his palette.
'But of course you'll be compelled--unless you wish to die "clemmed,"
as we say in Lancashire,' returned the other, briskly. 'What do you say,
mamma?'
He turned towards his wife, pushing up his spectacles to look at her. He
was a tall man, a little bent at the shoulders from long years of
desk-work; and those who saw him for the first time were apt to be
struck by a certain eager volatility of aspect--expressed by the small
head on its thin neck, by the wavering blue eyes, and smiling
mouth--not perhaps common in the chief cashiers of country banks.
As his wife met his appeal to her, the slight habitual furrow on her own
brow deepened. She saw that her husband held a newspaper crushed in
his right hand, and that his whole air was excited and restless. A
miserable, familiar pang passed through her. As the chief and trusted
official of an old-established bank in one of the smaller cotton-towns,
Mr. Morrison had a large command of money. His wife had suspected
him for years of using bank funds for the purposes of his own
speculations. She had never dared to say a word to him on the subject,
but she lived in terror--being a Calvinist by nature and training--of ruin
here, and Hell hereafter.
Of late, some instinct told her that he had been forcing the pace; and as
she turned to him, she felt certain that he had just received some news
which had given him great pleasure, and she felt certain also that it was
news of which he ought rather to have been ashamed.
She drew herself together in a dumb recoil. Her hands trembled as she
put down her knitting.
'I'd be sorry if a son of mine did nothing but paint portraits.'
John Fenwick looked up, startled.
'Why?' laughed her husband.

'Because it often seems to me,' she said, in a thin, measured voice, 'that
a Christian might find a better use for his time than ministering to the
vanity of silly girls, and wasting hours and hours on making a likeness
of this poor body, that's of no real matter to anybody.'
'You'd make short work of art and artists, my dear!' said Morrison,
throwing up his hands. 'You forget, perhaps, that St. Luke was a
painter?'
'And where do you get that from, Mr. Morrison, I'd like to ask?' said his
wife, slowly; 'it's not in the Bible--though I believe you think it is. Well,
good-night to you, Mr. Fenwick. I'm sorry you haven't enjoyed yourself,
and I'm not going to deny that Bella was very rude and trying.
Good-night.'
And with a frigid touch of the hand, Mrs. Morrison departed. She
looked again at her husband as she closed the door--a sombre,
shrinking look.
Morrison avoided it. He was pacing up and down in high spirits. When
he and Fenwick were left alone, he went up to the painter and laid an
arm across his shoulders.
'Well!--how's the money holding out?'
'I've got scarcely any left,' said the painter, instinctively moving away.
It might have been seen that he felt himself dependent, and hated to feel
it.
'Any more commissions?'
'I've painted a child up in Grasmere, and a farmer's wife just married.
And Satterthwaite, the butcher, says he'll give me a commission soon.
And there's a clergyman, up Easedale way, wants me to paint his son.'
'Well; and what do you get for these things?'
'Three pounds--sometimes five,' said the young man, reluctantly.

'A little more than a photograph.'
'Yes. They say if I won't be reasonable there's plenty as'll take their
pictures, and they can't throw away money.'
'H'm! Well, at this rate, Fenwick, you're not exactly galloping into a
fortune. And your father?'
Fenwick made a bitter gesture, as much as to say, 'What's the good of
discussing that?'
'H'm!--Well, now, Fenwick, what are your plans? Can you live on what
you make?'
'No,' said the other, abruptly. 'I'm getting