“I always told you she was keen. Cut us another slice. I wish you were not quite so deaf,” for Oliver’s attention had strayed back again to Laura. But Laura stood and watched them while her hand flashed and hesitated over her paper, with an air so impersonal in its very intentness that in some fashion it removed her from them, till at last they forgot her as one forgets the caged presence of some bright-eyed, all-attentive bird. They sat chatting together over their sandwiches, and, what with the sunshine and the tobacco smoke and the midday stillness, grew at last so drowsy that Justin, for one, jumped when Laura, with a despairing gesture that sent the charcoal flying, abandoned her easel and came to them across the room. “Well?” Oliver roused himself. Laura pushed aside her hair with the back of her blackened hand. She had managed in the last half-hour to make herself more dishevelled than Oliver had ever seen her. She was flushed to the eyes and she looked dead tired. But he perceived that whatever spirit had possessed her was departed. She answered, not him but Justin’s eyes, with a shrug, half deprecating, half defiant. “I’ve done. I’m afraid I’ve messed up the floor, Oliver. It’s no good, of course. Of course I can’t. Justin, I’m a conceited ass. Any lunch left? I’m starving. It’s—it’s an awfully tiring day.” She flung herself into a chair. “Oliver, get me a glass.” But Oliver, who, with an air of amused curiosity, had strolled across to the deserted easel, was staring from her sketch to her, and from her to Justin, and so back again to the sketch. Then he whistled—a prolonged and penetrating whistle. “Here, get up, Justin!” he commanded. “Let’s have a look at you.” Justin hauled himself out of his chair with a yawn and stood to attention. Oliver looked at him, as Laura had looked, through insolent, narrowed lids: indeed, for an instant, there was the oddest likeness between them, different in type as they were. When at last he addressed her, there was a new and intimate note in his voice— “I suppose you know what you’ve done?” “I know what I’ve not done. I don’t want butter, Oliver, I want water. I’m thirsty.” But he swept on excitedly as he went to fetch her a glass. “Oh, you’ve justified yourself. I—I’m half afraid of you. How did you see all that? I never saw all that——” “All what?” struck in Justin, as he considered himself critically, his head on one side. “What are you driving at? I think it’s rather good.” Laura smiled at them both with her mouth full. But Oliver continued to hold forth. His eyes danced. He shook a warning forefinger. “You’ll be a failure, you know. This sort of thing won’t get you into academies. What’s the use of painting what ought to be there? Eh? People want to be photographed. Ask Justin. Isn’t that so, Justin?”