It was three o’clock, but he had forgotten to lunch. Now that his emotions had been chilled, he remembered he was hungry. He looked around in vain for a mean eating-house, then reluctantly slipped into a public-house and ordered a glass of ale and something brown and dumpy which he saw under a glass cover. The wench who served him smiled so amiably that he was emboldened to ask if by chance she knew where Matthew Strang lived. Her smile died away, and nothing succeeded it.
“Matthew Strang, the painter,” said Matt, with a ghastly suspicion that the girl did not even know the name. London to him meant largely Matthew Strang; it was to Matthew Strang that he had taken his ticket and booked his passage, it was to get to Matthew Strang that he had starved and pinched himself, and it depressed him to discover the limitations of fame--to find that Matthew Strang was not hung in the air like Mohammed’s coffin, ’twixt earth and heaven, for all to see.
“There’s the Directory,” said the girl, lugging it down when she perceived that the good-looking young man with the curious drawling accent was not quizzing her. “You’ll find painters in the Trade Directory.”
The barmaid’s satire was unconscious. Understanding the bulky red volume but dimly, Matt hunted up “Strang” in the general section. He was surprised to see there was more than one person of that name. But fortunately there was only one Matthew Strang, and he lived in a side street off Cavendish Square. Warmly thanking the girl, Matt gulped down his ale and hurried out to inquire the way, munching the relics of the cake as he hastened towards the long-elusive goal. Very soon, scanning the numbers, his eye flashed and his heart leaped up. There it was--the magic name--actually ’twixt earth and heaven, painted above a shop-window. Surprised, he came to a stand-still.
The window was one which would have arrested him in any case, for it was illumined with paintings and engravings, and through the doorway Matt saw enchanting stacks of pictures mounting from floor to ceiling, and the side wall was a gallery of oils and water-colors, and an aroma of art and refinement and riches seemed over everything, from the gold of the frames of the oil-colors to the chaste creamy margins of the engravings. He entered the shop with beating heart. His eyes lit first on a sweet-faced matron in a cap standing at the far end of the shop, reverentially surveying a faded “Holy Family,” and while he was wondering whether she was the artist’s wife, a dapper young gentleman, installed behind a broad desk near the door, startled him by asking his business.