But Lise Olsdorf, abandoning herself to the fierce passion that had seized upon her, could not imagine that perhaps such a future loomed before her. The many hunting excursions of the prince left her practically at full liberty, for when the male guests of Pampeln were away hunting, there remained at the château scarcely any one but middle-aged, placid people, who retired early, and who, for that matter, on account of the very reputation of the princess, did not dream of spying upon her. Moreover, there was an excellent excuse for the lovers being for hours at a time together. The day after that which had settled their fate, the painter had begun the portrait of the mistress of Pampeln, and everybody--Pierre Olsdorf more than any one else--was interested in this work, which promised to be noteworthy. Under the empire of his passion for her, Paul Meyrin had at first wished to paint the princess as Diana the Huntress, her hair in a Grecian knot, her shoulders bare, her bust scarcely veiled; but, on seeing a sketch of the future picture, Lise Olsdorf was alarmed. It seemed to her that everything in it betrayed at once the painter's love for her, and she begged him not to go on with the work. Paul consented, but on condition that his model, re-enacting for him the shamelessness of the Italian princess for Canova, would let him some day secretly, for themselves alone, reproduce on canvas the splendor of all her beauty. And Lise, having promised in a passionate embrace, Paul Meyrin, going from one extreme to the other, painted her in a riding-habit, severely chaste. Within a fortnight the portrait was nearly finished, and the prince, who naturally suspected nothing of his conjugal misfortunes, thanked Paul Meyrin, and authorized him to take the portrait to Paris for hanging in the next exhibition. At each hour passed with Paul, the princess's love increased. It was in some sort purified by the admiration she felt for the artist at his work. While the sittings lasted, at liberty to see him for a long time every day, she loved him better and less wantonly; but, wishful as the painter was to linger with his work, prudence obliged him at last to admit that he had finished, and consequently to put an end to the daily interviews in private. Then Lise's passion retook its first fierce form. Deprived of the interviews in the course of which, satisfied and glutted, she could gather a store of calmness for the rest of the day, she became jealous, troubled, rash. Soon she was so little mistress of herself that General Podoi's wife, helped by her own experience in like affairs, guessed at a part, at least, of what was going on.