“Five years,” said Garnier. “You see, you are only beginning. The great thing in art is time; nothing is done without time and patience. Another thing: one must not think. Work away and don’t think. Don’t ask ‘How am I getting on?’ or, at least, only on New Year’s Day. Then, enjoy yourself, and keep your eyes open. Paris is a big atelier. An artist wants to study movement as well as the nude. I never walk down the street but I pick up something; it all comes in handy. If you want to paint life, you must dip your brush in everything, even mud. Those old men who spent their lives painting pots and pans and saints leave me cold. I would like to clap the Rue St. Honoré into a canvas—will, too, some day. I don’t think there is anything more fine in nature than a fire-engine going full speed to a fire, except, maybe, a dragon-fly.” Garnier buried his nose in his glass, and Toto put his chin on his palm, his elbow on the table, and stared before him, as if gazing at a cheerless view. “Or a girl flinging up her arms to yawn,” continued Garnier. “Girls are all art—that is why they make such rotten artists; but they are natural when they are flinging up their arms to yawn, or stooping to tie their garters, because then they think no one is looking at them, or they don’t care.” He held out a handful of cigarettes, and Toto took one. “I have never seen Célestin yawn,” said Toto in a meditative voice, as he lit the cigarette. “Heavens! no,” said Garnier. “Why not?” “The gift of weariness is not given to her. Have you ever seen a butterfly yawn, or a happy child?” “She _is_ happy!” said Toto in a half-regretful voice. “She is happiness, you mean. _Mon Dieu!_ yes, she is happiness; as for me, when I see her I always feel ten years younger, twenty years younger when she speaks, thirty years younger when she smiles.” “You are only twenty-five.” “Oh, yes; so you see, Mlle. Célestin’s smile puts me back to five years before my birth. I was then an angel, a fat little angel in the cherub cage; there I would have been still had not the Father Eternal put in his hand and taken me out, and flung me to the blue, crying ‘Try your wings.’ That is how the business is managed: the world is pursued by a flock of cherubs in search of a roost; when they overtake the world, they take it by storm, people want to marry, and that makes spring; when the world outstrips them that makes winter. I have never begotten a child, so I have never given a perch to one of those sparrow angels, worse luck!” and Garnier sighed and called for more beer. “Shall I tell you something?” asked Toto, who had been slowly making up his mind as the painter prattled. “Why, yes!” “Well, you remember, when I met you first, you asked me what my father was. I said he had a shop. Well, I told you a lie.” “_Ma foi!_ why not? What do I care what your father is?—you are a good fellow. That is enough for me. We all boast a bit, we artists.”