The Argosy — page 72: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Number Twenty-five. 59 of Mr. Claude Loseby passed between me and the sunshine. He walked to the edge of the wall and looked down, as if measuring the depth to which the shingle had been excavated by the waves —some fifteen feet in places—laying bare the masses of stone at the foundation. I objected to him—to his slouch, his shoulders, his coat, his big cigar, everything—more strongly by daylight than gaslight, if possible. However, when he sauntered up and civilly enough asked leave to look at my sketch, I responded amicably. “Oh, Claude, how exguzszte / how truly sweet /” interposed a sharp voice, and I beheld Madame in an elaborate serge costume of browns and scarlet at my elbow. Claude cut her raptures uncommonly short, and walked her off towards the older and more frequented part of the parade. I saw no more of them until after luncheon, when, warned by a well-known sensation of stiffness and numbness that open air work was of doubtful prudence in February, I established myself in the sunny drawing-room window with my easel and paints, and a break- water, some weed-hung piles, a rusty chain and a stranded boat for company. An empty carriage came round to the door, and I heard Mrs. Loseby’s voice in the hall. ‘Forgotten your cigar-case? [ll wait for you in here,” and she entered: a beautiful vision in golden tinted velvet, satin and fur; a marvellous costume that almost warmed up her tepid prettiness into beauty. She saw my approving glance and kindly gave me a better oppor- tunity of admiring her magnificence, placing herself directly in front of me in full sunlight and a well arranged attitude. I did not feel that she would resent the proceeding for a moment, when I took up a fresh block, dipped a brush in raw sienna, and set to work. Loseby was an unconscionable time finding his cigar-case, and I got a very fair sketch of the lady, face and all. She looked sweetly un- conscious during the performance, but threw me an arch glance as she passed out. ‘“‘ Ah, I guessed what you were doing. How very wicked of you; but one forgives everything to genius,” she simpered coquettishly. ‘‘ Who in the world could she have been ?” I wondered, as I put some additional touches to her portrait from memory, and, leaving it to dry, resumed my breakwater. An answer came to my question, through the window, in the course of the next few minutes. Two old gentlemen who had been pottering about the Parade had settled themselves and their cigars on a bench beneath me. ‘“ Yes, she’s had the handling of a tidy lot of money from first to last; and now she’s got a husband who’ll help her to make it fly, if Iam not much mis- taken. I knew her father once—Weatherhead, of Weatherhead and Watkins, drysalters; and I knew her first husband, Tom Perryman. A very decent fellow, Tom; and worth—aye, I might say, a quarter of a million, and be under the figure, when he died ; and all left to that chit of a Letty Weatherhead. The will was made before the boy ECOMICHOOKS. CO