ROSE-ANN’S bobbed hair was generally applauded. There were more studio parties. Felix frivoled, theorized, and wrote jocund1 dramatic criticisms, with the thought of Hawkins always at the back of his mind.
Hawkins’s play had been cast, re-cast, rewritten, and finally tried out “on the dog,” that is to say, an audience at Atlantic City. And something was still wrong. So the cast had been dismissed, the scenery stored, and Hawkins was desperately2 rewriting his play for the seventeenth time—this time in collaboration3 with an expert farce4-builder. And Felix remained for a while longer the acting5 dramatic critic of the Chronicle. He figured that if enough misfortunes happened to Hawkins’s farce, his own tenure6 in office might last long enough to entitle him to it in the end. With the most amiable7 feelings toward Hawkins, he nevertheless fervently8 wished “Tootsie-Wootsie” the worst of bad luck.
Meanwhile, early in January, he began having his portrait painted by Dorothy Sheridan.
2
Having one’s portrait painted was decidedly an experience. When he came for his first sitting, he found Dorothy Sheridan in a big kitchen apron9, with her sleeves rolled up, looking more as if she were going to cook a meal than paint a picture. She had called “Come!” to his knock, and when he entered she went on scraping the paint from a palette with no more than a casual nod to him. He put his hat under his arm, and shifting his stick to the crook10 of his elbow, took out a cigarette and lighted it; then turned and looked curiously11 and hesitantly about the room.
255“There! Keep that! Just that way!” Dorothy Sheridan called. “That’s very good. Very characteristic. No, just as you were. That’s right—relax a little.”
She gave him these orders from half way across the large studio room, where she stood in a brusque commanding attitude. Felix obeyed.
“One minute!” And she ran up the steps to the mezzanine behind and above Felix, and presently he heard from overhead the swish of falling cloth. He half turned, and saw that she had flung over the edge of the mezzanine railing a long piece of rose-coloured silk, which reached the floor behind him.
“That’s for a background,” she said, and Felix resumed his pose.
She came back, pushed out an easel not far from him and a little to one side, and then took up a position at a distance from both him and the easel, armed with a brown crayon. She looked at him intently, with wide eyes, bending a little, with head forward and face uplifted. “Mm,” she said, reflectively, and walked swiftly up to the easel and commenced to draw upon the blank canvas with swift, vigorous strokes of her crayon. After a little, she walked back to her former place, resumed her wide-eyed stare, and then returned once more to the canvas.
After half an hour of this, looking at her subject and drawing on the canvas in turn, she threw down her crayon. “Can you remember that pose?” she asked.
Of course Felix could remember it. It was a pose into which he fell naturally. “Yes,” he said. “May I look?”
“If you want to,” she said indifferently, taking off her apron.
Felix strolled over and looked at the crayon sketch12 on the canvas. It was a bold caricature of himself, poised13 hesitantly with stick and cigarette, blithe14, debonair15, and above all a figure of indecision. Was that himself?
“That’s all for today,” said the painter. “Same time, same day, next week. Don’t forget.”
He went away, startled and puzzled.
256Next week, as he came in, eager for one more look at that disconcerting caricature, he found the artist painting it out with a thin grey wash.
“Why do you do that?” he asked.
The portrait seemed to Felix completed at the end of an hour, when she declared the sitting over and took off her apron. It was utterly17 different from the crayon caricature which had preceded it on the canvas. Out of the misty18 grey background emerged a face and two hands, delicately painted, and catching19 the quizzical expression of mouth and eyes and the rather limp gesture of the hands, but in a manner which did not carry more than a few feet from the canvas. Moreover, this painting was utterly unlike the other things of hers that he had seen. He wondered, but the painter had hung up her apron and was looking at a portfolio20 of drawings, indifferent to his existence, so he withdrew.
The next time provided still a new surprise. The painter had just washed out the face and hands on the canvas with turpentine, and was scraping off the paint when he came in. Was this a confession21 of failure? or some new way of painting? or simply the way all painters went to work?
He was pretty certain, however, that the method pursued in this present sitting was extraordinary; for this time the painter measured his head with a pair of calipers22, up and down and in every direction, and noted23 down the figures on a piece of paper and regarded them thoughtfully. Then she came up to him and felt of his skull24 with her hands; it was not in the least like a caress—it was exactly as if she were a surgeon, and he were a patient, about to be operated upon.
“Bones!” she said, as if that explained everything, and went to work on her canvas with a brush dipped in blue paint.... The result, which Felix viewed with a very queer sensation at the end of the sitting, was a skeleton-like figure done in blue, with arms and legs like pieces of steel machinery25, 257and a face with dark blue eye sockets26 and a pale blue jaw27.... “Lines of force,” explained the painter, and he went away not knowing whether to laugh or not.
This skeleton was obliterated28 at the beginning of the fourth sitting, as the other stages of the picture had been, and Felix wondered, what next? Colour, it seemed, this time! Great splashes and daubs of colour, put on anyhow, spread out with a palette-knife, or the painter’s thumb—a riot, an orgy of rose and green and purple-brown, with only a suggestion of Felix amid the chromatic29 swirls30....
Felix described each of these stages to Rose-Ann with zest31, and went with infinite curiosity to every new sitting....
The fifth time there was a blank new canvas awaiting him, and when he asked what had become of the other, she replied: “Burned it up. All covered with paint. Always use a fresh canvas if you can afford it.”
She emerged from her preoccupation with her palette long enough to become aware of his surprise, and to explain further:
“All that was just getting acquainted with my subject. Now we’re ready to begin.”
And taking up her position, a little closer this time to him and the easel, she bent32 upon him that wide-eyed, impersonal33 stare.... Felix was rather in awe34 of her by this time. She had ceased to seem to him the careless, slangy bohemian girl that he had first known. She was an expert and delicate technician. Those four portraits in succession had stunned35 his imagination. She seemed to him almost superhuman—with a little of the flavour of black magic in her. That wide-eyed impersonal stare was part of the effect. At first she seemed merely a pretty girl lifting her face to yours and looking at you, steadily36; and if one was not used to returning the wide-eyed stare of a pretty girl, one became a little embarrassed—there is something so intimate about this meeting and touching37 through the eyes; one seems to be let in, unreservedly, to some mysterious depth. But, as the stare continued, piercing you, probing you, seeing you 258with calm indifference38, you became uneasy and almost afraid—you wanted to look away, and that seemed cowardly and evasive, so you kept on staring back as long as you could ... until those dark blue eyes of hers seemed profound gulfs over which you hung, dizzy, tottering39, about to drown.... And then, saying “Mm,” she went over to her canvas again and put on a little dab40 of paint. She had probably been considering carefully whether or not she had made your nose too long!
3
Felix raved41 in this fashion to Rose-Ann, who heard him with interest and in silence till he had finished.
“And what does the portrait look like now?” she asked.
“Well—very much like any other portrait, I must say. A little bolder, and lots of colour, but nothing startling. Or perhaps I’ve become so used to startling things by now that this seems a little tame.”
The last sitting was a prolonged one, in which the painter looked at him for what seemed hours at a time, and in which he could not rid himself of the perturbing42 conviction that she was seeing into his soul.... He was very tired when she finished at last—the sitting had as a matter of fact taken two hours, with only a few momentary43 rests—and Felix was in a mood of weariness and self-distrust when he went over to look at the completed portrait. Perhaps that accounted for what he saw:
Painted with an exquisite44 and mordant45 irony—with stick and cigarette, uncertainly halting, as if in front of life, the head tilted46 with a quirk47 of inquiry48, the face curious and evasive, with something that was almost boldness in the eyes, something that was almost courage in the chin—Felix Fay, observant, indecisive, inadequate49, against a rose-coloured background.
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1
jocund
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| adj.快乐的，高兴的 | |
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desperately
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| adv.极度渴望地，绝望地，孤注一掷地 | |
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collaboration
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| n.合作，协作；勾结 | |
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4
farce
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| n.闹剧，笑剧，滑稽戏；胡闹 | |
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acting
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| n.演戏，行为，假装；adj.代理的，临时的，演出用的 | |
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6
tenure
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| n.终身职位；任期；(土地)保有权，保有期 | |
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7
amiable
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| adj.和蔼可亲的，友善的，亲切的 | |
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fervently
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| adv.热烈地，热情地，强烈地 | |
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9
apron
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| n.围裙；工作裙 | |
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10
crook
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| v.使弯曲；n.小偷，骗子，贼；弯曲(处) | |
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curiously
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| adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地 | |
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12
sketch
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| n.草图；梗概；素描；v.素描；概述 | |
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13
poised
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| a.摆好姿势不动的 | |
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14
blithe
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| adj.快乐的，无忧无虑的 | |
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15
debonair
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| adj.殷勤的，快乐的 | |
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16
likeness
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| n.相像，相似（之处） | |
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17
utterly
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| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
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18
misty
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| adj.雾蒙蒙的，有雾的 | |
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19
catching
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| adj.易传染的，有魅力的，迷人的，接住 | |
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20
portfolio
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| n.公事包；文件夹；大臣及部长职位 | |
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21
confession
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| n.自白，供认，承认 | |
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22
calipers
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| n.书法，测径器；测径器 | |
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23
noted
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| adj.著名的，知名的 | |
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skull
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| n.头骨；颅骨 | |
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25
machinery
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| n.(总称)机械，机器；机构 | |
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26
sockets
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| n.套接字，使应用程序能够读写与收发通讯协定(protocol)与资料的程序( Socket的名词复数 )；孔( socket的名词复数 )；（电器上的）插口；托座；凹穴 | |
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27
jaw
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| n.颚，颌，说教，流言蜚语；v.喋喋不休，教训 | |
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28
obliterated
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| v.除去( obliterate的过去式和过去分词 )；涂去；擦掉；彻底破坏或毁灭 | |
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29
chromatic
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| adj.色彩的，颜色的 | |
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30
swirls
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| n.旋转( swirl的名词复数 )；卷状物；漩涡；尘旋v.旋转，打旋( swirl的第三人称单数 ) | |
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31
zest
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| n.乐趣；滋味，风味；兴趣 | |
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32
bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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33
impersonal
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| adj.无个人感情的，与个人无关的，非人称的 | |
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awe
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| n.敬畏，惊惧；vt.使敬畏，使惊惧 | |
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35
stunned
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| adj. 震惊的，惊讶的 动词stun的过去式和过去分词 | |
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36
steadily
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| adv.稳定地；不变地；持续地 | |
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37
touching
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| adj.动人的，使人感伤的 | |
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38
indifference
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| n.不感兴趣，不关心，冷淡，不在乎 | |
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39
tottering
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| adj.蹒跚的，动摇的v.走得或动得不稳( totter的现在分词 )；踉跄；蹒跚；摇摇欲坠 | |
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40
dab
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| v.轻触，轻拍，轻涂；n.(颜料等的)轻涂 | |
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41
raved
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| v.胡言乱语( rave的过去式和过去分词 )；愤怒地说；咆哮；痴心地说 | |
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42
perturbing
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| v.使（某人）烦恼，不安( perturb的现在分词 ) | |
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43
momentary
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| adj.片刻的，瞬息的；短暂的 | |
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44
exquisite
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| adj.精美的；敏锐的；剧烈的，感觉强烈的 | |
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45
mordant
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| adj.讽刺的；尖酸的 | |
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46
tilted
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| v. 倾斜的 | |
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47
quirk
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| n.奇事，巧合；古怪的举动 | |
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48
inquiry
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| n.打听，询问，调查，查问 | |
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49
inadequate
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| adj.(for,to)不充足的，不适当的 | |
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