“Well! Camille Favier is the Blue Duchess. She acts with talent, fantasy and grace! I discovered her. A year ago she was at the Conservatoire. I saw her there and recognized her talent, and when I sent my play to the Vaudeville, I told them I wanted her to take the part. They engaged her, and now she is famous. My luck is contagious. But you must do her portrait for me as she is in the play, a symphony in blue major! It will be a fine subject for you for the next Salon. I repeat I am very lucky. Then what a head she has for you: twenty-two years old, a complexion like a tea-rose, a mouth sad in repose and tender when smiling, blue eyes to complete the symphony, pale, pale, pale blue with a black point in the middle, which sometimes increases in size; her hair is the colour of oriental tobacco, and she is slender, supple and young. She lives with her mother in a third floor in the Rue de la Barcuellére, in your neighbourhood. That detail is good as a human document. People talk of the theatre’s corruption: nine hundred francs rent, one servant, and an outlook on a convent garden! She believes in her art, and in authors! She believes too much in them.” He said these words with a smile, the meaning of which was unmistakable. His remarks had been accompanied by an insolent and sensual look, gleaming and self-satisfied. I had no doubt as to the feeling the pretty actress inspired in him. He told me about these private matters in a very loud voice, with that apparent indiscretion which implies thoughtlessness and so well conceals design. But this sort of gossip always has a prudent limit. Besides, the diners at the next table were three retired generals, to interrupt whose conversation then gun-shot would have been required. The noises made by the thirty or forty persons dining were sufficient to drown even Jacques’ most distinct phrases. So there was really no reason for my companion to speak in low tones, as I did in questioning him. But what a symbol of our two destinies! I instinctively experienced, before even knowing Mademoiselle Favier, the shameful timidity of the sentiment of which Jacques experienced the joy. “You are paying court to her, that is what you mean?” I asked him.