"But, my dear chap----" "I'll explain later. But go--please!" With a glance toward the easel Mortimer Crabb went out. Ross Burnett closed the door, shot its bolt and put his back against it. As the clatter of Crabb's boots on the wooden stairs died away on the lower floor, he gave a sigh, folded his arms and waited. When Miss Darrow emerged from the dressing-room ready for the street, she found him there. "My things are in the portmanteau," she said, icily. "My maid will call for them. If you will permit me----" But Burnett did not move. "Miss Darrow----" he began. "Will you let me pass?" "I can't, Miss Darrow--until you hear. I wouldn't have had it happen for anything in the world." "I cannot listen. Won't you open the door?" He bowed his head as though better to receive her reproaches, but he did not move. "Oh!" she cried, "how could you!" Her chin was raised, and she glanced scornfully at him from under her narrowed lids. "Please," he pleaded, quietly. "If you'll only listen----" She turned and walked towards the window. "Isn't it punishment enough for it all to end like this," he went on, "without making it seem as though I were worse than I am? Really, I'm not as bad as I'm painted." It was an unfortunate phrase. An awkward silence followed it, in which he was conscious that Miss Darrow had turned suddenly from the window and was facing the Thing upon the easel, which was now revealed to them both in all its uncompromising ugliness. From the center of a myriad of streaks of paint something emerged. Something in dull tones, staring like a Gorgon from its muddy illusiveness. To Burnett it had been only a canvas daubed with infelicitous paint. Now from across the room it seemed to have put on a smug and scurrilous personality and odiously leered at him from its unlovely background. "Don't," cried Burnett. "Don't look at the thing like that." But the girl did not move. She stood before the easel, her head a little on one side, her eyes upon the canvas. "It's really not Victorian, is it?" she asked calmly. "You _must_ listen!" cried Burnett, leaving his post at the door. "I insist. You know why I did this mad thing. I've told you. I'd do it again----" "I've no doubt you will," she put in scornfully. "It doesn't seem to have been so difficult."