The Master Detective Part 32

"Perhaps not. He claims to paint character; possibly I might succeed in chiseling character, but give me a beautiful model, and as a rule I am content to show the surface only. Besides, the bust was for her, and I made the best of my subject."

"And in the Agricultural piece?" asked Quarles.

"Naturally I idealized her."

"I suppose he is not the born artist that Musgrave is?" I said, when Forbes had left us.

"I don't know," returned Quarles. "We will go and have another look at the bust, and I think on the way home we might drop in and have another look at Musgrave's picture."

"That portrait bothers me," I said. "One might suppose it was the key to the mystery."

"I am not sure that it isn't," Quarles answered.

Further acquaintance with the Academy picture had rather a curious effect upon me. I do not think I lost anything of my original sense of repulsion, but I was strangely conscious that there was something attractive in the face. I was astonished to find what a likeness there was between the portrait and the bust. The impression created by one became mingled with the impression made by the other.

I said as much to Quarles.

"That is tantamount to saying they are both fine pieces of work,"

he answered.

"And means, I suppose, that the real woman was somewhere between the two," said Zena.

"Possibly, but with Musgrave's idea the predominant truth," said Quarles.

"Why?" asked Zena.

Quarles shrugged his shoulders. He had no answer to give.

"The day after to-morrow, Wigan, we will go to the Agricultural Inst.i.tute."

"Why not to-morrow?"

"To-morrow I am busy. Did you know I was writing an article for a psychological review?"

On the following evening I took Zena to a theater--to the Olympic. I suppose I chose the Olympic with a sort of idea that I was keeping in touch with the case I had in hand, that if any one chanced to see me there they would conclude that I was following up some clue. It is hateful to feel that there is nothing to be done, more hateful still that people should imagine you are beaten or are neglecting your work.

Zena told me the professor had been out all day, but she did not know what business he was about. He was certainly not engaged in writing his article.

The Olympic was by no means full that night; the disappearance of the dancer was evidently having a disastrous effect upon the receipts.

The next day I went to the Agricultural Inst.i.tute with Quarles. He had got a card of introduction to the secretary.

The building had recently been enlarged, and at the top of the first flight of the staircase stood a group representing the triumph of modern methods.

Standing or crouching, and full of energy, were figures symbolic of science and machinery, while in the foreground was a rec.u.mbent figure from whose hands the sickle had fallen.

The woman was sleeping, her work done; yet she suggested that there was beauty in those old methods which, for all their utility, was lacking in the new.

"It is probably the best work that Lovet Forbes has done," said the secretary, who came round with us.

"He is the coming man, they say," Quarles remarked.

"He has surely arrived," was the answer, "for the critics are unanimous as to the beauty of this."

"Yes, it is remarkable in idea and execution. I am told the famous dancer, who has recently disappeared, was the model for the rec.u.mbent figure."

"So I understand. The figure is the gem of the whole composition."

Quarles was not inclined to endorse this opinion, and the secretary was nothing loath to argue the point.

The discussion led to a close examination of the figure, Quarles arguing that it was out of proportion in comparison with the standing figures, a comment which the secretary met with some learned words on the laws relating to perspective.

They were both a little out of their depth, I thought, and after a few moments I did not pay much attention to them. My thoughts had gone back to Musgrave's picture and to Forbes's bust of Madame Vatrotski. Zena had said that the real woman was probably somewhere between the two, and as I looked at the figure for which the dancer had been the model I felt she was right.

I suppose the limbs were perfect, but it was the face which chiefly interested mo. It was like Musgrave's picture, but it was more like Forbes's bust, with something in it which differed entirely from the bust and from the picture.

It was a beautiful figure, and I think the face was beautiful, but I am not sure.

The secretary had just measured the figure, and the result seemed to have established the fact that Quarles's contention was right. This evidently pleased him, and he was inclined to give way on minor points of difference.

"No doubt the sculptor's perspective has something to do with it," he said; "but we must not forget that the group is symbolic. I should not be surprised if the figure in the foreground is larger to ill.u.s.trate the fact that modern methods are of yesterday, while the sickle has reaped the harvests of the world from old time. The sickle is not broken, you observe, and the artist may mean that it will be used again in the time to come."

"You may be right," said the secretary. "I shall take an early opportunity of asking Forbes."

Soon afterwards, we left, and had got a hundred yards from the building when the professor suddenly found he had left his gloves behind in the library.

"I shall only be a minute or two, Wigan. Stop a taxi in the meantime."

He was longer than that, but he came back triumphant, waving the gloves, an old pair hardly worth returning for. He seemed able to talk of nothing but the symbolism of the group, finding many points in it which had escaped me entirely.

"It has given me an idea, Wigan."

"About Madame Yatrotski?"

"Yes; but we will wait until we get home."

We went straight to that empty room. Zena could not persuade the old man to have some tea first.

"Tea! I am not taking tea to-day. Bring me a little weak brandy and water, my dear."

"Don't you feel well?"

"Yes, but I am a little exhausted by talking to a man who thinks he understands art and doesn't."

"Oh, Murray doesn't pretend to understand it."

"Murray is not such a fool as he pretends to be, even in art; but I was thinking of the secretary, not Murray."

The brandy was brought, and then the professor turned to me.