“I suppose she babbles all the time!” said he. Pangbutt stiffened before the fire: “Lady Persimmon is a most charming woman,” he said. “Yes, yes; it’s in the family,” Anthony said airily--“she’s a sort of cousin of mine. My brother had rather a calf-love for her--when he was seventeen--and a calf.” Pangbutt flushed: “I do not care to discuss Lady Persimmon,” he said stiffly. “No, no; I can quite understand that,” said Anthony breezily. “Nor do I--nor do I. She was always rather uninteresting.” He walked over to the throne: “Ho, ho!” thought he. “H’m! ha! Paul still worships the titled classes. He was always weak in the first commandment.” He sat down wearily and searched aimlessly under the little covers of the cake-dishes on the tray. “Paul,” said he, “I exaggerated when I said there were crumbs....” And he added with a laugh--“I don’t suppose cousin Eleanor recognised cousin Anthony--I was only sixteen--besides, she would not be prepared for his rising at her pretty feet like a down-at-heels pantomime clown in this Palace of Art--this lofty pleasure-house.” “You wrong Lady Persimmon by insinuation,” said Pangbutt sulkily--“she is a woman of most generous sentiments.” Anthony uttered a funny little laughing grunt: “Cousin Eleanor was always the soul of sentiment and--delicate self-indulgence. She used to adore the portrait of Shelley--weep over Chatterton--cry over Kit Marlowe--and--married a baronet in an advanced state of decay.” He got up, strode to the easel again, and examined the picture. Pangbutt watched him under his brows with sulky attention, lolling against the mantelpiece. “Come, Paul, old boy,” Anthony said at last--“I’ve been sketching the doll’s soul for you; but you’ve got none of _that_ into her picture.... The colour and technique may be all there--and it is splendidly handled--_but where’s the woman?_” Anthony’s frank criticism, his just and keen appreciation of the good and the weak side of a work of art, had always won Pangbutt’s admiration; and the scowl left his eyes now as the praise bit into his conceit. The detraction passed by him: “D’you know, Anthony,” he said--“sometimes I suspect I am too successful--too easily successful--and I have a horror of becoming commonplace.” His eyes followed the other as he slouched carelessly back to the throne and flung himself upon it. “Pooh! Nonsense, Paul.” He searched aimlessly amongst the empty plates again: “That’s all cant. Look at _me_. I’m as empty as a bubble--but it’s just as difficult to write sparkling prose on an empty stomach as to be a poetic alderman.” Pangbutt gazed down at his own shining boots complacently: “I have not forgotten what personal discomfort was, in the old Paris days. I detested it. I determined from the first to be rid of it.... Where are you living?” The man that sat on the throne shrugged his shoulders, gazing at vacancy sadly: