Presently she began to wonder dimly if he were not more so; for underneath her assured calm of manner there was a wild excitement of which she was intensely aware, and all the force of her will was set upon the effort of concealing it from her companions. She did not wish Martha to know that she was excited; and to have this quiet man in front of her get even a suspicion that she was not fully as composed as he appeared to be, was a thought that she could not endure. She began to talk about the atelier where she and Martha had met and made friends, and she gave an amusing description of her first encounter with Etienne when she had gone there to enter her name as a pupil. “It was my first venture into the Bohemia of the Latin Quarter,” she said; “and I felt brave, but self-protective, when I reached the place and went in, with my maid, to investigate. The cloak-room was empty, and when I got to the atelier, and walked around the great piece of sail-cloth which turned its dirty and undecorated side toward me, I saw a fat little old man, in carpet slippers, and a dirty, besmeared linen blouse, and black skull-cap, washing brushes in some soft soap contained in an old lobster-can. ‘I wish to see M. Etienne,’ I said rather haughtily; and to my great indignation he answered, still dabbing and flattening out his brushes in their lather of soap, ‘What do you want with him?’ My maid quite jumped with fright, and I, wishing to show my courage, said severely, ‘That is what does not concern you.’ Instead of showing the self-abasement which I thought my rebuke merited, he said amiably, still rubbing his brushes round and round: ‘But yes, it does; for I’m the man you are looking for. What will you have?’ I was so honestly discomfited that he kindly came to the rescue, and, overlooking my blunder, began to talk business. I have heard since that the mistake which I made had been so frequently made before that I suppose he scarcely noticed it.” As she ceased speaking, the readiness with which Martha took advantage of the pause to move toward the dining-room suddenly made her aware that dinner must have been announced,--how long ago she could not tell,--and that her garrulous speech and gesticulation had prevented her from hearing it. Her back was toward the door; but how excited she must have been, and appeared, not to have been aware of the announcement! Her face flushed, and she bit her lip with vexation. Martha looked at her brother, supposing that he would offer his arm to their guest. Instead of doing so, however, he merely stood aside and waited for the two ladies to go into the dining-room before him. In doing this, Sonia passed very near him; and with a feeling of defiance in her breast she looked straight at him. He did not meet her gaze, however; for his own eyes were gravely lowered and hid behind a pair of heavy lids, the curves and lashes of which were startlingly familiar to her.