Part 8
only when they are laying right on the ground." Her favorite painter was Douglas
Bunting. (A name, I don't mind saying, I've tracked down to many a blind alley, over the
years.) She said her kittys always liked to "draw people when they are running and that
is the one thing I am terrible at." She said she would work very hard to learn to draw
better, and hoped we would not be very impatient with her.
There were, in all, only six samples of her work enclosed in the envelope. (All of her
work was unsigned--a minor enough fact, but at the time, a disproportionately
refreshing one. Bambi Kramer's and Ridgefield's pictures had all been either signed or--
and it somehow seemed even more irritating--initialled.) After thirteen years, I not only
distinctly remember all six of Sister Irma's samples, but four of them I sometimes think
I remember a trifle too distinctly for my own peace of mind. Her best picture was done
in water colors, on brown paper. (Brown paper, especially wrapping paper, is very
pleasant, very cosy to paint on. Many an experienced artist has used it when he wasn't
up to anything grand or grandiose.) The picture, despite its confining size (it was about
ten by twelve inches), was a highly detailed depiction of Christ being carried to the
sepulchre in Joseph of Arimathea's garden. In the far right foreground, two men who
seemed to be Joseph's servants were rather awkwardly doing the carrying. Joseph of
Arimathea followed directly behind them--bearing himself, under the circumstances,
perhaps a trifle too erectly. At a respectably subordinate distance behind Joseph came
the women of Galilee, mixed in with a motley, perhaps gate-crashing crowd of
mourners, spectators, children, and no less than three frisky, impious mongrels. For
me, the major figure in the picture was a woman in the left foreground, facing the
viewer. With her right hand raised overhead, she was frantically signalling to someone--
her child, perhaps, or her husband, or possibly the viewer--to drop everything and
hurry over. Two of the women, in the front rank of the crowd, wore halos. Without a
Bible handy, I could only make a rough guess at their identity. But I immediately
spotted Mary Magdalene. At any rate, I was positive I had spotted her. She was in the
middle foreground, walking apparently self-detached from the crowd, her arms down at
her sides. She wore no part of her grief, so to speak, on her sleeve--in fact, there were
no outward signs at all of her late, enviable connections with the Deceased. Her face,
like all the other faces in the picture, had been done in a cheap-priced, ready-made
flesh-tint. It was painfully clear that Sister Irma herself had found the color
unsatisfactory and had tried her unadvised, noble best to tone it down somehow. There
were no other serious flaws in the picture. None, that is, worthy of anything but
cavilling mention. It was, in any conclusive sense, an artist's picture, steeped in high,
high, organized talent and God knows how many hours of hard work.
One of my first reactions, of course, was to run with Sister Irma's envelope over to M.
Yoshoto. But, once again, I kept my seat. I didn't care to risk having Sister Irma taken
away from me. At length, I just closed her envelope with care and placed it to one side
of my desk, with the exciting plan to work on it that night, in my own time. Then, with
far more tolerance than I'd thought I had in me, almost with good will, I spent the rest
of the afternoon doing overlay corrections on some male and female nudes (sans sex
organs) that R. Howard Ridgefield had genteely and obscenely drawn.
Toward dinner time, I opened three buttons of my shirt and stashed away Sister
Irma's envelope where neither thieves, nor, just to play safe, the Yoshotos, could break
in.
A tacit but iron-bound procedure covered all evening meals at Les Amis Des Vieux
MaRres. Mme. Yoshoto got up from her desk promptly at five-thirty and went upstairs
to prepare dinner, and Mr. Yoshoto and I followed--fell into single file, as it were--at six
sharp. There were no side trips, however essential or hygienic. That evening, however,
with Sister Irma's envelope warm against my chest, I had never felt more relaxed. In
fact, all through dinner, I couldn't have been more outgoing. I gave away a lulu of a
Picasso story that had just reached me, one that I might have put aside for a rainy day.
M. Yoshoto scarcely lowered his Japanese newspaper to listen to it, but Mme. Yoshoto
seemed responsive, or, at least, not unresponsive. In any case, when I was finished with
it, she spoke to me for the first time since she had asked me that morning if I would like
an egg. She asked me if I were sure I wouldn't like a chair in my room. I said quickly,
only when they are laying right on the ground." Her favorite painter was Douglas
Bunting. (A name, I don't mind saying, I've tracked down to many a blind alley, over the
years.) She said her kittys always liked to "draw people when they are running and that
is the one thing I am terrible at." She said she would work very hard to learn to draw
better, and hoped we would not be very impatient with her.
There were, in all, only six samples of her work enclosed in the envelope. (All of her
work was unsigned--a minor enough fact, but at the time, a disproportionately
refreshing one. Bambi Kramer's and Ridgefield's pictures had all been either signed or--
and it somehow seemed even more irritating--initialled.) After thirteen years, I not only
distinctly remember all six of Sister Irma's samples, but four of them I sometimes think
I remember a trifle too distinctly for my own peace of mind. Her best picture was done
in water colors, on brown paper. (Brown paper, especially wrapping paper, is very
pleasant, very cosy to paint on. Many an experienced artist has used it when he wasn't
up to anything grand or grandiose.) The picture, despite its confining size (it was about
ten by twelve inches), was a highly detailed depiction of Christ being carried to the
sepulchre in Joseph of Arimathea's garden. In the far right foreground, two men who
seemed to be Joseph's servants were rather awkwardly doing the carrying. Joseph of
Arimathea followed directly behind them--bearing himself, under the circumstances,
perhaps a trifle too erectly. At a respectably subordinate distance behind Joseph came
the women of Galilee, mixed in with a motley, perhaps gate-crashing crowd of
mourners, spectators, children, and no less than three frisky, impious mongrels. For
me, the major figure in the picture was a woman in the left foreground, facing the
viewer. With her right hand raised overhead, she was frantically signalling to someone--
her child, perhaps, or her husband, or possibly the viewer--to drop everything and
hurry over. Two of the women, in the front rank of the crowd, wore halos. Without a
Bible handy, I could only make a rough guess at their identity. But I immediately
spotted Mary Magdalene. At any rate, I was positive I had spotted her. She was in the
middle foreground, walking apparently self-detached from the crowd, her arms down at
her sides. She wore no part of her grief, so to speak, on her sleeve--in fact, there were
no outward signs at all of her late, enviable connections with the Deceased. Her face,
like all the other faces in the picture, had been done in a cheap-priced, ready-made
flesh-tint. It was painfully clear that Sister Irma herself had found the color
unsatisfactory and had tried her unadvised, noble best to tone it down somehow. There
were no other serious flaws in the picture. None, that is, worthy of anything but
cavilling mention. It was, in any conclusive sense, an artist's picture, steeped in high,
high, organized talent and God knows how many hours of hard work.
One of my first reactions, of course, was to run with Sister Irma's envelope over to M.
Yoshoto. But, once again, I kept my seat. I didn't care to risk having Sister Irma taken
away from me. At length, I just closed her envelope with care and placed it to one side
of my desk, with the exciting plan to work on it that night, in my own time. Then, with
far more tolerance than I'd thought I had in me, almost with good will, I spent the rest
of the afternoon doing overlay corrections on some male and female nudes (sans sex
organs) that R. Howard Ridgefield had genteely and obscenely drawn.
Toward dinner time, I opened three buttons of my shirt and stashed away Sister
Irma's envelope where neither thieves, nor, just to play safe, the Yoshotos, could break
in.
A tacit but iron-bound procedure covered all evening meals at Les Amis Des Vieux
MaRres. Mme. Yoshoto got up from her desk promptly at five-thirty and went upstairs
to prepare dinner, and Mr. Yoshoto and I followed--fell into single file, as it were--at six
sharp. There were no side trips, however essential or hygienic. That evening, however,
with Sister Irma's envelope warm against my chest, I had never felt more relaxed. In
fact, all through dinner, I couldn't have been more outgoing. I gave away a lulu of a
Picasso story that had just reached me, one that I might have put aside for a rainy day.
M. Yoshoto scarcely lowered his Japanese newspaper to listen to it, but Mme. Yoshoto
seemed responsive, or, at least, not unresponsive. In any case, when I was finished with
it, she spoke to me for the first time since she had asked me that morning if I would like
an egg. She asked me if I were sure I wouldn't like a chair in my room. I said quickly,
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