Lenox set his lips, and confounded the advantages nature and art conspire to bestow upon some women, more especially when they know themselves beloved. The mere man in him had one impulse only,--to take instant possession of her; to conquer her lurking antagonism by sheer force of passion and of will. But he had sense enough to know that such primitive methods would not shift, by one hair's-breadth, their real point of division; would, in fact, be no less than inverted defeat. The heart of her was secure:--that he knew. It was her detached, elusive mind and spirit that were still to win; and a man's arms had small concern with that form of capture. Quita vouchsafed him a glance as he entered. Then her gaze returned to the picture. "One misses him," she said, presumably to the tall figure on the hearth-rug. "I think I have never known a man so uniformly cheerful and sweet-tempered. But it is selfish to grudge him a little change of atmosphere. And no doubt he is having a livelier evening than we are." She was facing her husband now; but something in his aspect made her feel suddenly ashamed of using small weapons against a nature too magnanimous to retaliate. And, without giving him time to answer, she went on, a little hurriedly, "Eldred, if this intolerable state of things means that you really imagine I am--how does one put anything so detestable?--growing . . . too fond of Mr Richardson, you can set your mind at rest. Morality apart, you are much too masterful, too large--in every way--to leave room for any one else in a woman's heart, once she has let you in." "Thank you," Lenox answered, in a non-committal tone. But a shadow passed from his face, and she saw it. "Of course I know it has been rather marked this last week. But that was simply because for the moment he and my picture were the same thing. Being absorbed in one meant being absorbed in the other. To produce a living portrait, one needs to get inside the subject of it as far as possible. At least, I do. And on the whole, I think my method is justified by the result!" But Lenox, as he stood listening, experienced fresh proof of man's innate spirit of perversity. For many days past he had been angered by the suspicion that in this affair of portrait painting, the subject counted for too much;--and now, when he ought to have been relieved, he found his anger rekindled to white heat by Quita's frank confession that his friend--whose heart had been wrenched from him by her so-called 'method'--counted for nothing at all. For one ignoble instant, he was tempted to break through every restraining consideration and lash her with the truth. The fact that he did not answer her at once puzzled Quita. "Do you understand now, _mon ami_?" she asked, coming a step closer. "I was absorbed in an interesting subject. It is over--_voila tout_."