"I--I should like to tell you how grateful I am--" he began. "There is no need," she responded with bitter lightness. "You will pay me some day--when you are a great artist." But when she reached the next landing she glanced down and saw that he still stood beneath watching her. * * * * * The next day she kept her word and went to him. She found his room poorer and barer even than she had fancied it might be. The ceiling was low and slanting; in one corner stood a narrow iron bedstead, in another a wooden table; in the best light the small window gave his easel was placed with a chair before it. When he had opened the door in answer to her summons, and she saw all this, she glanced quickly at his face to see if there was any shade of confusion upon it, but there was none. He appeared only rejoiced and eager. "I felt sure it was you," he said. "Were you then so sure that I would come?" she asked. "You said you would," he answered. He placed her as he wished to paint her, and then sat down to his work. In a few moments he was completely absorbed in it. For a long time he did not speak at all. The utter silence which reigned--a silence which was not only a suspension of speech but a suspension of any other thought beyond his task--was a new experience to her. His cheek flushed, his eyes burned dark and bright; it seemed as if he scarcely breathed. When he turned to look at her she was conscious each time of a sudden thrill of feeling. More than once he paused for several moments, brush and palette in hand, simply watching her face. At one of these pauses she herself broke the silence. "Why do you look at me so?" she asked. "You look at me as if--as if--" And she broke off with an uneasy little laugh. He roused himself with a slight start and colored sensitively, passing his hand across his forehead. "What I want to paint is not always in your face," he answered. "Sometimes I lose it, and then I must wait a little until--until I find it again. It is not only your face I want, it is yourself--yourself!" And he made a sudden unconscious gesture with his hands. She tried to laugh again,--hard and lightly as before,--but failed. "Myself!" she said. "_Mon Dieu!_ Do not grasp at me, Monsieur. It will not pay you. Paint my flesh, my hair, my eyes,--they are good,--but do not paint _me_." He looked troubled. "I am afraid my saying that sounded stilted," he returned. "I explained myself poorly. It is not easy for me to explain myself well." "I understood," she said; "and I have warned you." They did not speak to each other again during the whole sitting except once, when he asked her if she was warm enough. "I have a fire to-day," he said. "Have you not always a fire?" she asked. "No," he answered with a smile; "but when you come here there will always be one." "Then," she said, "I will come often, that I may save you from death."