So from horror he passed to a personal relief, of which he was rather ashamed, and then again to a real uneasy pity for the wife and for the vulgar daughter who had so bitterly resented his handling of her charms.  He remembered the note in which she had acknowledged the final delivery of her portrait.  In obedience to Morrison’s suggestion, he had kept it by him a few days; and then, either unable or proudly unwilling to alter it, he had returned it to its owner.  Whereupon a furious note from Miss Bella, which—­knowing that her father took no account of her tempers—­Fenwick had torn up with a laugh.  It was clear that she had heard of her father’s invitation to him to ‘beautify’ it, and when the picture reappeared unaltered she took it as a direct and personal insult—­a sign that he disliked her and meant to humiliate her.  It was an odd variety of the spretae injuria formae.  Fenwick had never been in the least penitent for his behaviour.  The picture was true, clever—­and the best he could do.  It was no painter’s business to endow Miss Bella with beauty, if she did not possess it.  As a piece of paint, the picture had beauty—­if she had only eyes to find it out.

Poor girl!—­what husband now would venture on such a termagant wife?—­penniless too, and disgraced!  He would like to help her, and her mother—­for Morrison’s sake.  Stirred by a fleeting impulse, he began to scheme how he might become their benefactor, as Morrison had been his.

Then, as he raised his eyes from the path—­with a rush of delight he noticed the flood of afternoon sunlight pouring on the steep fell-side, the sharp black shadows thrown by wall and tree, the brilliance of the snow along the topmost ridge.  He raced along, casting the Morrisons out of his thoughts, forgetting everything but the joy of atmosphere and light—­the pleasure of his physical strength.  Near one of the highest crags he came upon a shepherd-boy and his dog collecting some sheep.  The collie ran hither and thither with the marvellous shrewdness of his breed, circling, heading, driving; the stampede of the sheep, as they fled before him, could be heard along the fell.  The sun played upon the flock, turning its dirty grey to white, caught the little figure of the shepherd-boy, as he stood shouting and waving, or glittered on the foaming stream beside him.  Purple shadows bathed the fell beyond—­and on its bosom the rustic scene emerged—­a winter idyl.

Fenwick sat down upon a rock, ransacked his pockets for sketch-book and paints, and began to sketch.  When he had made his ‘note,’ he sat lost a while in the pleasure of his own growing skill and sharpening perceptions, and dreaming of future ‘subjects.’  A series of ‘Westmoreland months,’ illustrating the seasons among the fells and the life of the dalesmen, ran through his mind.  Nature appeared to his exultant sense as a vast treasure-house stored for him only—­a mine inexhaustible offered to his craftsman’s hand.  For him the sweeping