“Then ought there not to be mystery about the face and form of your Isis on her pedestal?” “Is it not there? Is there not mystery in the face and form of every woman that walks the earth?” “Doubtless; but you desire--do you not?--to show--that although this is the very lady the young man loved before ever he sought the shrine of the goddess, not the less is she the goddess Isis herself?” “I do--or at least I ought; only--by Jove! you have already looked deeper into the whole thing than I!” “There may be things to account for that on both sides,” said Malcolm. “But one word more to relieve my brain:--if you would embody the full meaning of the parable, you must not be content that the mystery is there; you must show in your painting that you feel it there; you must paint the invisible veil that no hand can lift, for there it is, and there it ever will be, though Isis herself raise it from morning to morning.” “How am I to do that?” said Lenorme, not that he did not see what Malcolm meant, or agree with it: he wanted to make him talk. “How can I, who never drew a stroke, or painted anything but the gunnel of a boat, tell you that?” rejoined Malcolm. “It is your business. You must paint that veil, that mystery in the forehead, and in the eyes, and in the lips--yes, in the cheeks and the chin and the eyebrows and everywhere. You must make her say without saying it, that she knows oh! so much, if only she could make you understand it!--that she is all there for you, but the all is infinitely more than you can know. As she stands there now,----” “I must interrupt you,” cried Lenorme, “just to say that the picture is not finished yet.” “And yet I will finish my sentence, if you will allow me,” returned Malcolm. “--As she stands there--the goddess--she looks only a beautiful young woman, with whom the young man spreading out his arms to her is very absolutely in love. There is the glow and the mystery of love in both their faces, and nothing more.” “And is not that enough?” said Lenorme. “No,” answered Malcolm. “And yet it may be too much,” he added, “if you are going to hang it up where people will see it.” As he said this, he looked hard at the painter for a moment. The dark hue of Lenorme’s cheek deepened; his brows lowered a little farther over the black wells of his eyes; and he painted on without answer. “By Jove!” he said at length. “Don’t swear, Mr Lenorme,” said Malcolm. “--Besides, that’s my Lord Liftore’s oath.--If _you_ do, you will teach my lady to swear.” “What do you mean by that?” asked Lenorme, with offence plain enough in his tone. Thereupon Malcolm told him how on one occasion, himself being present, the marquis her father happening to utter an imprecation, Lady Florimel took the first possible opportunity of using the very same words on her own account, much to the marquis’s amusement and Malcolm’s astonishment. But upon reflection he had come to see that she only wanted to cure her father of the bad habit.