“In her house, I think. I found her in the gutters of St. Antoine--she left me in a silk dress I had starved myself to buy, I never succeeded after that, and as I went down she went up, and now you will find very high personages indeed at her little suppers. She is now, I believe, a spy among the Courts of Europe--and once she was my inspiration,” he added, in a dry tone. The sordidness of this disgusted Luc. “It is weakness to pin your fortunes to the skirts of a woman,” he said. The painter looked at him. “Are _you_ going your way uncheered by any thought of any woman? Can you manage without laying your ambitions at some one’s feet?” Luc flushed. “I have never met the woman who could break my heart,” he answered. “Yet----” added the painter. “As for my picture,” he continued, “I took her, for some reason, as Bellona, with the hounds in leash and her drapery carried by a light wind. The drapery was very well put in.” The daylight was now full in the sombre room, and the dark furniture stood out clear against the shining walls; it fully revealed, too, the young artist, and showed that his peculiar pallor was no trick of light, but the colour of his face. Luc watched him keenly. There seemed a wildness in his words, in his expression, in his action in asking for the company of a stranger, that made Luc think that perhaps some anguish had sent him out of his wits; but even while he was thinking this, and wondering what comfort he could offer, the painter turned in a perfectly composed manner, and raising the hour-glass from the table between the windows, looked at it with a smile. The sand had nearly run through. “Now I will keep you no longer, Monsieur,” he said, in an even voice. “And if you wish to see my pictures--there is one I should like to show you, a little later in the morning; it is not yet quite completed.” Luc could see no brushes, paints, or easel in the plain bedchamber, nor any sign that the painter could finish any canvas; again he thought he detected a wildness in the man’s speech. “I shall be glad to see you again,” he said. “I fear this visit, Monsieur, has been of little use; but since you would give me no confidence, I could give you no consolation.” The painter smiled; he was still looking at the hour-glass. “Where there is no hope, how can there be any consolation?” he replied. “You have rendered me all the service I required--half an hour’s company.” He set down the hour-glass, went to the door and opened it. “You are searching for glory, are you not, Monsieur?” he asked, as Luc passed him. “Well, the word is a lie; there is no such thing--it is all a cloud of delusion; and when you have pierced the cloud, you find there is nothing there but the blankness of despair.” “No!” cried Luc, with energy. “No!” The painter shook his head in contradiction with a ghastly smile and closed the door on the Marquis, who heard immediately the bolts being slipped into place. CHAPTER V