neficiaries under the will, and
it was upon the images of these features that Roger labored. He leaned
far forward, with his face close to the canvas, holding his brushes
after the Spencerian fashion, working steadily through the afternoon,
and, when the light grew dimmer, leaning closer to his canvas to see.
When it had become almost dark in the room, he lit a student-lamp with
a green-glass shade, and, placing it upon a table beside him, continued
to paint. Ariel's voice interrupted him at last.

"It's quitting-time, grandfather," she called, gently, from the doorway
behind him.

He sank back in his chair, conscious, for the first time, of how tired
he had grown. "I suppose so," he said, "though it seemed to me that I
was just getting my hand in." His eyes brightened for a moment. "I
declare, I believe I've caught it a great deal better. Come and look,
Ariel. Doesn't it seem to you that I'm getting it? Those pearly
shadows in the flesh--"

"I'm sure of it. Those people ought to be very proud to have it." She
came to him quietly, took the palette and brushes from his hands and
began to clean them, standing in the shadow behind him. "It's too good
for them."

"I wonder if it is," he said, slowly, leaning forward and curving his
hands about his eyes so as to shut off everything from his view except
the canvas. "I wonder if it is!" he repeated. Then his hands dropped
sadly in his lap, and he sank back again with a patient kind of
revulsion. "No, no, it isn't! I always think they're good when I've
just finished them. I've been fooled that way all my life. They don't
look the same afterwards."

"They're always beautiful," she said, softly.

"Ah, ah!" he sighed.

"Now, Roger!" she cried, with cheerful sharpness, continuing her work.

"I know," he said, with a plaintive laugh,--"I know. Sometimes I think
that all my reward has been in the few minutes I've had just after
finishing them. During those few minutes I seem to see in them all
that I wanted to put in them; I see it because what I've been trying to
express is still so warm in my own eyes that I seem to have got it on
the canvas where I wanted it."

"But you do," she said. "You do get it there."

"No," he murmured, in return. "I never did. I got out some of the old
ones when I came in this morning, some that I hadn't looked at for
years, and it's the same with them. You can do it much better
yourself--your sketches show it."

"No, no!