The Call of the Cumberlands
Page 86"Samson," suggested the painter, when the dinner things had been
carried out and they were alone, "you are here for two purposes: first
to study painting; second, to educate and equip yourself for coming
conditions. It's going to take work, more work, and then some more work."
"I hain't skeered of work."
"I believe that. Also, you must keep out of trouble. You've got to
ride your fighting instinct with a strong curb."
"I don't 'low to let nobody run over me." The statement was not
argumentative; only an announcement of a principle which was not
subject to modification.
The boy gazed into the fire for a few moments of silence.
"I gives ye my hand on thet," he promised.
At eleven o'clock the painter, having shown his guest over the
premises, said good-night, and went up-town to his own house. Samson
lay a long while awake, with many disquieting reflections. Before his
closed eyes rose insistently the picture of a smoky cabin with a
puncheon floor and of a girl upon whose cheeks and temples flickered
orange and vermilion lights. To his ears came the roar of elevated
trains, and, since a fog had risen over the Hudson, the endless night-
mattress which seemed hard and comfortless, and longed for a feather-bed.
"Good-night, Sally," he almost groaned. "I wisht I was back thar whar
I belongs." ... And Sally, more than a thousand miles away, was
shivering on the top of a stile with a white, grief-torn little face,
wishing that, too.
Meanwhile Lescott, letting himself into a house overlooking the Park,
was hailed by a chorus of voices from the dining-room. He turned and
went in to join a gay group just back from the opera. As he
thoughtfully mixed himself a highball, they bombarded him with questions.
girl, who looked very much as Lescott himself might have looked had he
been a girl--and very young and lovely. The painter always thought of
his sister as the family's edition de luxe. Now, she flashed on
him an affectionate smile, and added: "We have been waiting to see him.
Must we go to bed disappointed?"
George stood looking down on them, and tinkled the ice in his glass.
"He wasn't brought on for purposes of exhibition, Drennie," he smiled.
"I was afraid, if he came in here in the fashion of his arrival--carrying
his saddlebags--you ultra-civilized folk might have laughed."