“I think I know such an artist, ma’am,” I said. “He has painted many portraits recently and has had much praise for them. His name is Keefe O’Connor.”
“Keefe O’Connor,” she said musingly. “Do you know him personally, Azalea? But I think I have heard you say so.”
“He is the brother of my dear Mary Cecily Rowantree,” I said.
“Oh, yes, the Rowantrees of Rowantree Hall!”
She never forgets that the Rowantrees are of Rowantree Hall. You and I love the ramshackle old place so that we forget what a grand name it has. Grandmother, I suppose, thinks of it as a magnificent ancestral estate. What would she say if she could see that the gallery, instead of being supported by pillars, is held up by barked chestnut logs, and that there never has been a second coat of paint on the place. Ugh, how the wind can blow through those unfinished rooms! I sometimes think it is the most uncomfortable place I ever was in. A little mountain cabin is twenty times as warm and cosy in the winter time.
I would have liked to have told grandmother all this, but I knew it would be fatal; that if I did, she would just set the Rowantrees down as people I ought not to know, so I said nothing. By and by she remarked:
“Have you any idea of the prices of your friend’s portraits?”
Again I knew that I must mention a good price to make her respect him, so I said:
“I think he would paint your portrait, grandmother, for a thousand dollars. And we could entertain him, I suppose? That would make it so much more agreeable, wouldn’t it?”
“Oh, we would entertain him, certainly,” said grandmother. “We have a room built especially for studio purposes. I believe you never have seen it. It is in the west wing, and faces north. There is a bedroom attached. It always has been the custom of the Knoxes to have their portraits painted in the house and by someone with whom they were in daily association. Such intercourse assists in the understanding so necessary to the production of a good likeness.”
So I asked her if I had her permission to write to Keefe, and she said yes. I have written him.
By the way, was I rather down-in-the-mouth in my last letter? Please forget about it. I suppose it was only a spell of homesickness. Seeing so many strangers and being expected to like them all, and to act as if I always had known them, rather upset me.