had reported, with his first exhibition and had
not lost ground with the second--a very interesting letter had come from
M. Charles saying that the Paris pictures would be shown in Paris in
July--gave them a great estimate of him. Angela was a veritable queen in
this home atmosphere; and as for Eugene, he was given the privilege of
all geniuses to do as he pleased. On this occasion Eugene was the centre
of interest, though he appeared not to be, for his four solid Western
brothers-in-law gave no indication that they thought he was unusual. He
was not their type--banker, lawyer, grain merchant and real estate
dealer--but they felt proud of him just the same. He was different, and
at the same time natural, genial, modest, inclined to appear far more
interested in their affairs than he really was. He would listen by the
hour to the details of their affairs, political, financial,
agricultural, social. The world was a curious compost to Eugene and he
was always anxious to find out how other people lived. He loved a good
story, and while he rarely told one he made a splendid audience for
those who did. His eyes would sparkle and his whole face light with the
joy of the humor he felt.

Through all this--the attention he was receiving, the welcome he was
made to feel, the fact that his art interests were not yet dead (the
Paris exhibition being the expiring breath of his original burst of
force), he was nevertheless feeling the downward trend of his affairs
most keenly. His mind was not right. That was surely true. His money
affairs were getting worse, not better, for while he could hope for a
few sales yet (the Paris pictures did not sell in New York) he was not
certain that this would be the case. This homeward trip had cost him two
hundred of his seventeen hundred dollars and there would be additional
expenses if he went to Chicago, as he planned in the fall. He could not
live a single year on fifteen hundred dollars--scarcely more than six
months, and he could not paint or illustrate anything new in his present
state. Additional sales of the pictures of the two original exhibitions
must be effected in a reasonable length of time or he would find himself
in hard straits.

Meanwhile, Angela, who had obtained such a high estimate of his future
by her experience in New York and Paris, was beginning to enjoy herself
again, for after all, in her judgment, she seemed to be able to manage
Eugene very well. He might have had some s