For two or three days she went out looking for pupils. One evening she came home excited.
“Joe, dear,” she said, joyfully, “I’ve a pupil. And, oh, the loveliest people! General – General A. B. Pinkney’s daughter – on Seventy-first street. Such a splendid house, Joe – you should see the front door! And inside! Oh, Joe, I never saw anything like it before.
“My pupil is his daughter Clementina. I dearly love her already. She’s a delicate thing – dresses always in white; and the sweetest, simplest manners! Only eighteen years old. I’m to give three lessons a week; and, just think, Joe! $5 a lesson. I don’t mind it a bit; for when I get two or three more pupils I can resume my lessons with Herr Rosenstock. Now, smooth out that wrinkle between your brows, dear, and let’s have a nice supper.”
“That’s all right for you, Dele,” said Joe, “but how about me? Do you think I’m going to let you hustle for wages while I wander in the regions of high art? By no means! I guess I can sell papers or lay cobblestones,[23] and bring in a dollar or two.”
Delia came and hung about his neck.
“Joe, dear, you are silly. You must keep on at your studies. It is not as if I had quit my music and gone to work at something else. While I teach I learn. I am always with my music. And we can live as happily as millionaires on $15 a week. You mustn’t think of leaving Mr. Magister.”
“All right,” said Joe. “But I hate for you to be giving lessons. It isn’t Art. But you’re a trump and a dear[24] to do it.”
“When one loves one’s Art no service seems too hard,” said Delia.
“Magister praised the sky in that sketch I made in the park,” said Joe. “And Tinkle gave me permission to hang two of them in his window. I may sell one if the right kind of a wealthy idiot sees them.”
“I’m sure you will,” said Delia, sweetly. “And now let’s be thankful for Gen. Pinkney and this veal roast.”
* * *
During all of the next week the Larrabees had an early breakfast. Joe was enthusiastic about some morning-effect sketches he was doing in Central Park, and Delia packed him off breakfasted, praised and kissed at 7 o’clock. Art is an engaging mistress. It was most times 7 o’clock when he returned in the evening.
At the end of the week Delia, sweetly proud but weary, triumphantly tossed three five-dollar bills on the table.