RODERICK HUDSON
suffer for it in every corner of my mind, and that I must do what I can to give you back?"
"Do what you can then," said Roderick, throwing out and dropping his arms. "Do what you can, my dear man, by all means." He stood there an instant limpidly, beautifully passive—the image of some noble and incureable young spendthrift winding up a slightly sordid interview with his disagreeably lucid but quite trusty man of business. Then he gave his friend his hand firmly, as if in sanction of the latter's freedom of action—after which they separated.
His bust of his mother, whether or no it were a discharge of what he called the filial debt, was at least a most interesting thing. Rowland, at the time it was finished, met Gloriani one evening, and this confident critic was eager for news of it. "I 'm told our high-flying friend has really come down to earth. He has been doing a queer little old woman."
"A queer little old woman!" Rowland exclaimed. "My dear sir, she's Hudson's admirable mother."
"All the more reason for her being queer! It 's a thing for terra-cotta, eh?"
Rowland hesitated but a moment. "If there were a big enough piece in the world it would be a thing for ivory."
His friend looked doubtful. "Oh, ivoiy begs the question. Why not fine gold? It was described to me at all events as a charming piece of quaintness; a little demure, thin-lipped old lady with her head on one side and the prettiest wrinkles in the world—a sort of fairy godmother."
361
