It lay on the skylight of the studio
across the road in cold silver; she stared at it intently and her thoughts
began to slide one into the other. The shadow of the big bell-handle in the
wall grew short, lengthened again, and faded out as the moon went down behind
the pasture and a hare came limping home across the road. Then the dawn-wind
washed through the upland grasses, and brought coolness with it, and the cattle
lowed by the drought-shrunk river. Maisie's head fell forward on the window-
sill, and the tangle of black hair covered her arms.
"Maisie, wake up. You'll catch a chill."
"Yes, dear; yes, dear." She staggered to her bed like a wearied child, and as
she buried her face in the pillows she muttered, "I think--I think--But he
ought to have written."
Day brought the routine of the studio, the smell of paint and turpentine, and
the monotone wisdom of Kami, who was a leaden artist, but a golden teacher if
the pupil were only in sympathy with him. Maisie was not in sympathy that day,
and she waited impatiently for the end of the work.
She knew when it was coming; for Kami would gather his black alpaca coat into a
bunch behind him, and, with faded flue eyes that saw neither pupils nor canvas,
look back into the past to recall the history of one Binat.
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