Here, where one sought the genuine old colonial—though usually in vain, to be sure—to come upon this curious classical twist!
Even as I wondered, my eye fell upon a fresh subject, and the wonder changed to genuine admiration and sharpened to a very keen curiosity concerning the artist who achieved such arresting beauty with such crude materials. It was a broken painting, like a Venus with a missing arm. It showed the head and shoulders of Pallas Athena and the head and shoulders of a youth who played to her on a double flute. The goddess' head, which still bore the warrior's helmet, was bent in a listening attitude toward the music, and her pose was one of relaxation and peace after fierce combat.
It was a quiet thing, with quiet, flowing lines, for all the unfinished ragged edge which cut the figures off just above the waist. Somehow, it held the dignity and sincerity of great, religious art. And now I noticed that there were other identical Athenas, that the fragmentary painting recurred on fully half of the book ends: as though it were the motif of all his work, I thought—the one serious theme running through all these lighter themes.
"But only a man thoroughly steeped in Greek mythology—loving it—could do that—"
"Pardon, sir?" said the young woman who kept shop.
"This! It's rather remarkable. Who is he—tell me about him!" I begged of her impulsively.
"I can’t tell you much. He lives alone over on the back shore, and he brings us these to sell. His name is Twining—'Tinker' Twining, they call him."
"But this broken thing—what does it mean?"
She shook her head.
"He never talks; only say he hasn't the pattern for the rest, and it would be sacrilege to finish it without the true lines."
"Hm—reverence and a conscience," I muttered; "rare enough these days. I'll take the pair of them. How much?"
"Five dollars."
"And a pair of the nymphs," I added, since it seemed absurdly cheap,
"Sorry, but we've only one of those. It's used as a door prop, you see."
"No, not a door prop!" I lamented. "But I'd use mine as book ends, and I'd put the Romantic Poets between them."
"I'll tell you,"—the girl turned suddenly helpful,—"you might leave an order with us for Mr. Twining to paint you one. He’d be glad to do it."
"Or I might take the order to Mr. Twining myself," I exclaimed eagerly. I've a car outside and I've time to kill. How do I get to him?"
"But you can't drive. You follow the sand road to the end, and then take a narrow path across to the ocean side. It's three miles over, the only house—"
"No matter! I've a fancy to meet him. Oh, I see by your face you wouldn't advise it."
"It's only that he's—something of a hermit," she hesitated. "He's a very courteous old gentleman, but no one ever visits him."
"Then it's time some one started, and I've a faculty for getting on with hermits," I assured her gaily.
I thanked her, found a quiet inn, parked my car for the night, and started on a late afternoon ramble for the back shore and a Mr. "Tinker" Twining.
I followed a sand trail like a wind-white chalk line between growths of springy hog cranberry, scrub oak and pine—a most desolate and forsaken country—until at last I stepped out abruptly upon a high cliff over the Atlantic Ocean.
Clouds had sponged out blue sky, and instead of the late sunlight there was a strange yellow glow over everything. All those light, bright Cape colors—turquoise blue-and gay copper-gold and honey-yellow—had been dimmed.
The sea was very still, of dull purples and greens, and the broad cream beach, below the sand scrap upon which I stood, had a grayish tinge. Above me, on the highest point of the cliff and huddled too close to its shifting edge, was one of those low, weather-beaten, Cape houses. I climbed to it, and wading through beech grass and vines of the wild beach pea, came to the back door.
The house was quiet, and I had a glimpse of a scrupulously neat, old-style kitchen—cumbersome flatirons in a row and a brick oven built into the chimney—as I stood there hesitating.
Then, against a further window which framed the lowering sea and sky, I saw the profile of an old, white-haired man.
He sat at a work bench and he held a brush poised in his hand, but he was not painting. His head was up and he was listening—it was almost as though he were listening to that strange electric yellow that permeated all the air, was the queer thought I had. I was struck at once by the extreme delicacy and the fine-drawn suffering of the old man's face; indeed, the lines of that tragic profile might have been traced with the single fine bristle of his own brush, in those same delicate browns and purples.
Moreover, the setting was all wrong: the old, frail face was somehow not up to that sullen sweep of sky and ocean. It was as though an exquisite thing of beaten and fretted silver should be mounted alone upon a coarse expanse of dull burlap—a broad background that called for granite at least.
I tapped, and the old man stirred.
"Good afternoon," I called.
He came slowly to the door.
"They sent me from that antique place—the Open Latch. I’d like to get you to do me another book end."
"Book end?" he muttered.
"I hoped you might be willing to paint it and send it on to me."
"Ah yes." Clearly he was following me only with his eyes; with his soul he was still listening to his own thoughts.
I found myself puzzled as to how to reach him. A baffling aroma of archaism hung about this elderly man: breathed not only from his worn black suit, which was not of this day, but also from his manner and the very inflection of his voice, which-were somehow reminiscent of the old school.
"The nymphs," I insisted; "the one of Nausicaa."
There I caught him, "Nausicaa—you knew?"
"Well, I guessed."
"They don't as a rule; to the general they are merely odd little maidens sporting at ball." His smile came out as pure gold filtered from the dross of suffering—a rare, lovable smile that immediately won me to the old gentleman. "I shall be happy to paint the Nausicaa for you, sir," he added formally, and awaited my further pleasure.
"The name," I said; "perhaps you'd better jot down my name and address."
"Of course—the name." Obediently he brought pad and pencil, and in a fine, scholarly hand wrote "Mr. Claude Van Nuys," with my New York address.
Absently, he permitted me to pay him and stood ready to bid me good afternoon.
Still I lingered. "The sileni; and the goddess on the swan—Aphrodite, isn't she?"
"You pass, my boy,—grade A," he smiled.
"And the Pallas Athena—that's splendid work, only why—?"
"Ah, the Athena!" A flicker of pain touched the old man’s face, and he grew reticent and vague again.
I would have given him up then, had not a terrific and absolutely unheralded blast of wind come to my assistance,
