But Raymond, you remember, was only seven years high in his sandal shoon. His nose hardly reached to the top of the modelling-stand. He was forced to mount a box to carry out his decorative intentions. The little typewriter box would do. Now! A slender sausage of clay moustache on the left of the lady’s mouth, another on the right; for the chin, a rather stouter lump. No compromises anywhere; swift work, and sure. Raymond stepped down from his box, and walked slowly backward, quite in his father’s manner, to study the effect. Alas, how brief is the delirium of design! Raymond’s flight of genius was over, and the result appalled him. Indeed, it was rather remarkable, that transformation; and very curious is the power of a bit of clay, in willing fingers! That beautifully modelled countenance no longer suggested Madam Randolph of Highcourt; it had become the face of some Light-Horse Harry, some devil-may-care D’Arcy of the Guards. If that portrait had been scarce feminine enough before, what was it now, with those singular additions bristling from lips and chin? A warrior, no less. A moment ago, a lady; at present, a grenadier! An uninstructed observer, suddenly encountering that piece of family sculpture, might well ask, in his bewilderment, “But why does the noble Confederate officer wear a lace kerchief over his epaulets?” Raymond himself could no longer endure the power of his own performance. He darted back toward his box, to annul his handiwork. Too late! In his terror he heard a voice in the garden, near at hand; his father was talking with the old lady of Highcourt. Having finished their excellent morning sitting (indeed, it was the last sitting that would be needed until marble-time should come), artist and model had strayed into the garden to see the Antonin Mercié phlox in all its glory; Raymond’s father made a specialty of that, in honor of M. Mercié, his old master in sculpture. The two had touched lightly on many topics,—phlox, M. Mercié, old masters, sculpture,—_que sais-je?_ And now the old lady of Highcourt, with a new thrill in her voice, was speaking very earnestly about a projected portrait in bronze, a work the sculptor seemed unwilling to undertake. He said, with force, that he much preferred to work from life. In working from photographs, he couldn’t do justice to himself, or his subject, or his client. And the old lady was ruthlessly chaffing him because, in his Northern way, he was putting himself, the artist, first, and herself, the client, last. Her face beamed with mischief as she spoke. Beware of that old lady, she has her designs on the sculptor; she means, by hook or by crook, to make him do her bidding! She has managed many men, in her time; and always in her own way, so that they shall not perceive what is happening to them, until at last they have become the willing clay in her fingers.