"Yes, my dear Porbus," Frenhofer resumed, "I have failed thus far to meet an absolutely flawless woman, a body the outlines of which are perfectly beautiful, and whose colouring--But where is she to be found in real life?" he asked, interrupting himself, "that undiscoverable Venus of the ancients, so often sought, of whom we find only a few scattered charms? Oh! to see for an instant, but a single time, that divine, complete, in a word, ideal nature, I would give my whole fortune. Aye, I would seek thee in the abode of the dead, O divine beauty! Like Orpheus, I would go down into the hell of art to bring life back thence." "We may go away," said Porbus to Poussin; "he neither hears nor sees us now." "Let us go to his studio," suggested the wonder-struck youth. "Oh! the old fellow knows how to keep people out. His treasures are too well guarded for us to obtain a glimpse of them. I have not awaited your suggestion and your longing before attacking the mystery." "So there is a mystery?" "Yes," Porbus replied. "Old Frenhofer is the only pupil whom Mabuse would ever consent to take. Having become his friend, his saviour, his father, Frenhofer sacrificed the greater part of his property to humour Mabuse's passions; in exchange Mabuse bequeathed to him the secret of _relief_, the power of imparting to figures that extraordinary appearance of life, that touch of nature, which is our never-ending despair, but of which he was such a thorough master that one day, having sold and drunk the flowered damask which he was to wear on the occasion of Charles V.'s entry into Paris, he attended his master in a garment of paper painted to represent damask. The peculiar brilliancy of the fabric worn by Mabuse surprised the Emperor, who, when he attempted to compliment the old drunkard's patron, discovered the fraud.