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This was sarcasm run mad; but I listened to it and resented it as little as I enjoyed it. My companion seemed to possess a sort of demonic veracity of which the influence was irresistible. I questioned his sincerity so little that, if I offered him charity, it was with no intention of testing it. “I dare say you’ve immense talent,” I said, “but you’ve horrible manners. Nevertheless, I believe you will perceive that there is no reason why our conversation should continue; and I should pay you a poor compliment in thinking that you need to be bribed to withdraw. But since M. Martinet isn’t here to lend you a louis, let me act for him. ” And I laid the piece of gold on the table.

He looked at it hard for a moment and then at me, and I wondered whether he thought the gift too meagre. “I won’t go so far as to say that I’m proud,” he answered at last. “But from a lady,ma foi! it’s beggarly——it’s humiliating. Excuse me then if I refuse; I mean to ask for something else. To do me justice, remember that I speak to you not as a man, but as an artist. Bestow your charity on the artist, and if it costs you an effort, remember that that is the charity which is of most account with heaven. Keep your louis; go and stand as you’ve been standing for this picture, in the same light and the same attitude, and then let me look at you for three little minutes. As he spoke he drew from his pocket a ragged note-book and the stump of a pencil. The few scrawls I shall make here will be your alms. ”

He spoke of effort, but it is a fact that I made little to comply. While I resumed my familiar attitude in front of Harold’s canvas, he walked rapidly across the room and stooped over a chair upon which a mass of draperies had been carelessly tossed. In a moment I saw what had attracted him. He had caught a glimpse of the famous yellow scarf, glowing splendidly beneath a pile of darker stuffs. He pulled out the beautiful golden-hued tissue with furious alacrity, held it up before him and broke into an ecstasy of admiration. “What a tone——what a glow——what a texture! In Heaven’s name, put it on!” And without further ceremony he tossed it over my shoulders. I need hardly tell you that I obeyed but a natural instinct in gathering it into picturesque folds. He rushed away, and stood gazing and clapping his bands. “The harmony is perfect——the effect sublime! You possess that thing and you bury it out of sight? Wear it, wear it, I entreat you——and your portrait——but ah!” and he glared angrily askance at the picture: “you’ll never wear it there!”

“We thought of using it, but it was given up. ”

“Given up?Quelle horreur! He hadn’t the pluck to attack it! Oh, if I could just take a brush at it and rub it in for him!” And, as if possessed by an uncontrollable impulse, he seized poor Harold’s palette. But I made haste to stop his hand. He flung down the brushes, buried his face in his hands, and pressed back, I could fancy, the tears of baffled eagerness. “You’ll think me crazy!” he cried.

He was not crazy, to my sense; but he was a raging, aimless force, which I suddenly comprehended that I might use. I seemed to measure the full proportions of Harold’s inefficiency, and to foresee the pitiful result of his undertaking. He wouldn’t succumb, but he would doggedly finish his task and present me, in evidence of his claim, with a dreadful monument of his pretentious incapacity. Twenty strokes from this master-hand would make a difference; ten minutes work would carry the picture forward. I thrust the palette into the young mans grasp again and looked at him solemnly. “Paint away for your life,” I said; “but promise me this: to succeed!”