But she was. I knew it by the way she looked at Vard,
who was sitting opposite, his wolfish profile thrown back, the shaggy
locks tossed off his narrow high white forehead. The girl worshipped him.
She went on to say how glad she was that I saw him as she did. So many
artists admired only regular beauty, the stupid Greek type that was made
to be done in marble; but she'd always fancied from what she'd seen of my
work--she knew everything I'd done, it appeared--that I looked deeper,
cared more for the way in which faces are modelled by temperament and
circumstance; "and of course in that sense," she concluded, "my father's
face _is_ beautiful."
This was even more staggering; but one couldn't question her divine
sincerity. I'm afraid my one thought was to take advantage of it; and I
let her go on, perceiving that if I wanted to paint Vard all I had to do
was to listen.
She poured out her heart. It was a glorious thing for a girl, she said,
wasn't it, to be associated with such a life as that? She felt it so
strongly, sometimes, that it oppressed her, made her shy and stupid. She
was so afraid people would expect her to live up to _him_. But that was
absurd, of course; brilliant men so seldom had clever children. Still--did
I know?--she would have been happier, much happier, if he hadn't been in
public life; if he and she could have hidden themselves away somewhere,
with their books and music, and she could have had it all to herself: his
cleverness, his learning, his immense unbounded goodness.
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