human
You have been in this room before?
gpt
Once before. It is very much richer now. She indicated the new picture as she spoke, a large canvas of the Crucifixion.
human
There are two titles for it, explained Kimberly,
gpt
I hope you are going to like it,
human
What is the verdict?
gpt
Nothing I have ever seen of Rubens’s leaves me unmoved, she answered.
human
This is almost overwhelming, terrible.
gpt
Mrs. MacBirney likes my ’Crucifixion,’ Dolly,
human
Oh, you needn’t quote Alice, exclaimed Dolly from a window seat.
gpt
So do I like it. All I said was, that it is a sin to pay so much for a picture.
human
No price is too great for a great inspiration. See, he pointed for Alice to the face of a Roman soldier cowering in the foreground of the canvas.
gpt
There is one man’s face. Hamilton has studied a good many pictures and watched unnumbered faces in every expression of suffering. He has told me that, so far as he knows pictures, the emotion of fear has never been depicted on the human countenance except in that face. As a great surgeon, of a very wide experience, he may be said to know what fear pictured on a human face should be. And there it is before us. Conceive what a triumph for that man to have achieved this, so far from us in the dead centuries, and yet so near to us in this magic of his skill. Observe what a background he has chosen to depict it from--Jerusalem, bathed in the uncanny, terrifying light that accompanies a convulsion of nature. The earth rent, the dead issuing from their graves, nature prostrate, and everywhere--brooding over everything, but stamped most of all on this one guilty face--fear. How it all builds up the agony of that death sweat on the cross! By Heaven, it is tremendous! And Dolly says it is a sin to spend so much money for it. Brother Francis doesn’t agree with her; I found him in here early one morning saying his prayers to it.
human
Before it,
gpt
I thought that no mean tribute. Frankly, do you think me extravagant?
human
Did you really pay the price named in the newspapers?
gpt
Even then?
human
It does take one’s breath away--at least, it took mine.
gpt
I have wanted this picture for years. Hamilton made one trip over with me to look at it--he told me of it first. Then I had to wait all these years for the opportunity to acquire it.
human
What patience!
gpt
It must have taken patience to paint it. But patience gives us everything in this life. Alice was silent.
human
You don’t agree with me?
gpt
How do you know that?
human
I feel it; the air is thick with your dissent. But, Alice, I am right and you are wrong.