The Coming of Bill | Page 5

"Nothing besides? No serious illnesses?"
"None."
"What is your age?"
"Twenty-five."
"Are your parents living?"
"No."
"Were they healthy?"
"Fit as fiddles."
"And your grandparents?"
"Perfect bear-cats. I remember my grandfather at the age of about a
hundred or something like that spanking me for breaking his pipe. I
thought it was a steam-hammer. He was a wonderfully muscular old
gentleman."
"Excellent."
"By the way," said Kirk casually, "my life is insured."
"Very sensible. There has been no serious illness in your family at all,
then, as far as you know?"
"I could hunt up the records, if you like; but I don't think so."
"Consumption? No? Cancer? No? As far as you are aware, nothing?
Very satisfactory."
"I'm glad you're pleased."

"Are you married?"
"Good Lord, no!"
"At your age you should be. With your magnificent physique and
remarkable record of health, it is your duty to the future of the race to
marry."
"I'm not sure I've been worrying much about the future of the race."
"No man does. It is the crying evil of the day, men's selfish absorption
in the present, their utter lack of a sense of duty with regard to the
future. Have you read my 'Dawn of Better Things'?"
"I'm afraid I read very few novels."
"It is not a novel. It is a treatise on the need for implanting a sense of
personal duty to the future of the race in the modern young man."
"It sounds a crackerjack. I must get it."
"I will send you a copy. At the same time I will send you my 'Principles
of Selection' and 'What of To-morrow?' They will make you think."
"I bet they will. Thank you very much."
"And now," said Mrs. Porter, switching the conversation to the gaping
George, "you had better put this man to bed."
George Pennicut's opinion of Mrs. Porter, to which he was destined to
adhere on closer acquaintance, may be recorded.
"A hawful woman, sir," he whispered as Kirk bore him off.
"Nonsense, George," said Kirk. "One of the most entertaining ladies I
have ever met. Already I love her like a son. But how she escaped from
Bloomingdale beats me. There's been carelessness somewhere."
The bedrooms attached to the studio opened off the gallery that ran the

length of the east wall. Looking over the edge of the gallery before
coming downstairs Kirk perceived his visitor engaged in a tour of the
studio. At that moment she was examining his masterpiece, "Ariadne in
Naxos." He had called it that because that was what it had turned into.
At the beginning he had had no definite opinion as to its identity. It was
rather a habit with his pictures to start out in a vague spirit of adventure
and receive their label on completion. He had an airy and a dashing
way in his dealings with the goddess Art.
Nevertheless, he had sufficient of the artist soul to resent the fact that
Mrs. Porter was standing a great deal too close to the masterpiece to get
its full value.
"You want to stand back a little," he suggested over the rail.
Mrs. Porter looked up.
"Oh, there you are!" she said.
"Yes, here I am," agreed Kirk affably.
"Is this yours?"
"It is."
"You painted it?"
"I did."
"It is poor. It shows a certain feeling for colour, but the drawing is
weak," said Mrs. Porter. For this wonderful woman was as competent
at art criticism as at automobile driving and first aid. "Where did you
study?"
"In Paris, if you could call it studying. I'm afraid I was not the model
pupil."
"Kindly come down. You are giving me a crick in the neck."

Kirk descended. He found Mrs. Porter still regarding the masterpiece
with an unfavourable eye.
"Yes," she said, "the drawing is decidedly weak."
"I shouldn't wonder," assented Kirk. "The dealers to whom I've tried to
sell it have not said that in so many words, but they've all begged me
with tears in their eyes to take the darned thing away, so I guess you're
right."
"Do you depend for a living on the sale of your pictures?"
"Thank Heaven, no. I'm the only artist in captivity with a private
income."
"A large income?"
"'Tis not so deep as a well, nor so wide as a church door, but 'tis enough,
'twill serve. All told, about five thousand iron men per annum."
"Iron men?"
"Bones."
"Bones?"
"I should have said dollars."
"You should. I detest slang."
"Sorry," said Kirk.
Mrs. Porter resumed her tour of the studio. She was interrupted by the
arrival of the doctor, a cheerful little old man with the bearing of one
sure of his welcome. He was an old friend of Kirk's.
"Well, what's the trouble? I couldn't come sooner.