White Ashes | Page 5

kind of sauce so thin that the frames, instead of being
placed on easels, had to be laid flat on table tops in order to keep the
pictures from running off their canvases onto the floor while being
painted. But with people, his first likes and dislikes were definite and
usually final, and this quality of personal consistency had come to a
fixed focus on Helen Maitland.
Helen, for her part, had never given him any other encouragement than
to express her approval of some of his pictures that she honestly liked,
but Pelgram needed no other encouragement. His cosmos bulged with
ego of such density that he and his pastels and nocturnes were crowded
together in it indistinguishably. Admiration of his work was necessarily
admiration of himself. It was only a question of degree. With an
extraordinary manifestation of good taste and common sense,
amounting almost to inspiration, he had some time since decided that
he would like to marry Miss Maitland, but his admiration for her was
so deep that his self-assurance was shaken to the point of hesitation.
Thus far he had not ventured to speak, but his heart bounded at her
swift defense of him and her effective attack on Wilkinson.
In the brief pause, while Wilkinson was rallying his forces for another
charge on Pelgram's tonal battlements, John M. Hurd entered the room.
Mr. Hurd was a thickset man with a firm, clean-shaven jaw and a face
furrowed by deep lines, but with eyes that oddly enough looked

comparatively youthful and capable not only of appreciating humor,
but even of manufacturing it. He appeared to be a man who, by the
exercise of his pronounced talent for commercial strategy, could drive,
without an atom of pity, his opponent into a corner, but who, after
penning him there, could take an almost boyish amusement in watching
the unfortunate's futile efforts to escape. The magnate was dressed in a
dark cutaway coat with gray trousers, a pear-shaped turquoise pin
adorned his black tie, and his dress fully reflected the solid
respectability of the directors' meeting from which he had just come.
He took up his position, standing with his back to the window, stirring
the sugar in the cup of tea which his daughter had given him. His
entrance had snapped the tension between his impecunious
step-nephew and the painter.
"Well, how are you all?" he remarked genially. "Really, Isabel, you
have quite a salon. How is the portrait going, Helen?--or should I have
asked the artist and not the subject? Glad to see you, Cole--is the fire
insurance business good? Do you know, I made quite a lot of money
out of insurance last year--had it figured out recently."
"In what way, sir?" Cole politely inquired, anticipating the answer.
"By not insuring anything," replied Mr. Hurd, with a short laugh.
"Hello, Charlie, had a busy day?"
As Wilkinson's extreme disinclination for industry of any legitimate
sort was well known to all the party, Mr. Hurd's innocently expressed
but barb-pointed question brought a general smile, and Pelgram
permitted himself the luxury of a suggestive cough.
"Well, no, Uncle John," replied the young man addressed, half
apologetically. "Physically, to-day has been on the whole rather restful;
however, my active mind has been running as usual at top speed," he
added.
Mr. Hurd felt inclined to concede the activity of his nephew's mind, in
so far that he had never known its headlong flight to be delayed by

contact with an idea--that is to say, an idea of any particular value. Still,
in the presence of the rest he spared his young relative, merely
remarking dryly and in a manner intended to create the impression of
closing the incident with the honors on his own side, "I dare say if your
mind runs long enough, Charlie, it will eventually be elected."
This rejoinder had no definite meaning, but that fact in itself made any
retort comparatively difficult, and Wilkinson merely helped himself in
silence to another sandwich.
Presently Bennington Cole announced that he must be going on, as he
had an appointment with an out-of-town insurance agent who was
leaving Boston that evening, and soon afterward Miss Maitland took
her departure, escorted by Pelgram. Then Wilkinson went, having
executed as much havoc as he could among the comestibles, and Isabel
was left with her father. Mr. Hurd lit a cigar and looked thoughtfully at
his daughter.
"Splendid appetite that young feller has," he observed, nodding toward
the large tray which stood almost nude of food.
The girl moved a little uneasily in her chair.
"Now, father," she protested, "you shouldn't be so hard on Charlie. He's
really in a very embarrassing position. He's never had a chance to show
what he could do if he found something he liked and was