The Last Leaf
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The Last Leaf
In his wonderful short-story The Last Leaf, O.Henry depicts a really admirable person – old Behrman.
The story depicts the lives of artists in America at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. At that time arts people were massively settling in Greenwich Village attracted by eighteen century gables, Dutch attics and low rents, making this district an arts hub of this huge city.
Two young artists Sue and Johnsy meet at a cafД©. They become friends and find their tastes and opinions so congenial that they decide to have a joint studio and move to the top of a squatty, three-story brick house.
November comes and Johnsy falls ill with pneumonia. She lies on her bed looking through the small Dutch window-panes at the blank side of the next brick house. The doctor sees that his patient has made up her mind that she is not going to get well and tells Sue privately that Johnsy has a one-in-ten chance of survival and “that chance is for her to want to liveÐ. If you get her to ask one question about the new winter styles in cloak sleeves I will promise you a one-in-five Chance for her, instead of one-in-ten”.
Johnsy has a high temperature; she mishears the doctors words and thinks that when the last of the ten leaves of the ivy vine on the brick wall in front of their window falls down she will die, too. After a while Sue arranges a board and begins to paint a pen-and-ink drawing that she has to finish for the next day. She hears Johnsys low voice, several times repeated, goes to her bedside and sees her looking out of the window and counting backwards. Johnsy explains that she is counting the remaining leaves on the ivy vine and tells her “when the last one falls I must go, tooÐ Didnt the doctor tell you?”
Sue tries to persuade her that the doctor said exactly the opposite, and then asks her not to look out of the window until she goes and brings old Behrman who she needs as a model for her painting.
Old Behrman is an artist living on the ground floor of their house. He seems to be a failure in art because for years he has painted nothing but low-quality commercial and advertising pictures. He earns a little money by serving as a model to those young artists in the colony who cannot pay the price of a professional. Though, he is ambitious and confident that one day he is going to paint a masterpiece.
Sue goes downstairs and asks Behrman to serve as a model for her painting of a hermit miner. She is very worried and tells him of Johnsys obsession and her fear that poor Johnsy is not going to endure the illness. Behrman gets angry at Johnsys fancy and they go upstairs to the girls apartment.
That night a cold November wind blows and it rains hard. The next morning Johnsy asks Sue to pull up the window shade. They are astonished to see the one last leaf of the vine that has endured the terrible storm. Another day passes and the leaf is still there clinging to its stem against the wall. Johnsys mood improves; she sits up on her bed and even agrees to eat some chicken broth.
That afternoon the doctor examines Johnsy and tells Sue that the chances are now even and the patient needs good care. Then he adds that he has another patient downstairs, ill with pneumonia, saying that he is “some kind of artist”.
The next day the doctor says Johnsy is out of danger and Sue has won.
That afternoon Sue tells Johnsy that Old Behrman has died. “Mr. Behrman has died of pneumonia in the hospital. He was ill only two days. The janitor found him the morning of the first day in his room downstairs helpless with pain. His shoes and clothing were wet through and icy cold. They couldnt imagine where he had been on such a dreadful night. And then they found a lantern, still lighted, and a ladder that had been dragged from its place, and some scattered brushes, and a palette with green and yellow colors mixed on it, and Ð- look out the window, dear, at the last ivy leaf on the wall. Didnt you wonder why it never fluttered or moved when the wind blew? Ah, darling, its Behrmans masterpiece Ð- he painted it there the night that the last leaf fell”.
Old Behrman gives his life to to save the young girl. He creats his masterpiece in the gentlest manner imaginable. He is a true hero created by a most skillful