"I think I could arrange that," replied his aunt. She drew on an expression of decorous and pensive sadness, and Truesdale knew that she was mentally detaching her crayon of the dear departed from that elaborate white and gold apparatus in her parlor. "And if you should care for a few Persian rugs hung up around...." "By all means!" cried Truesdale. "And a few Bedouin rifles; and a few bits of brasswork from Cairo; and a few scraps of drapery from Bombay or Trebizond; and one of those inlaid Turkish tables; and one or two stacks of old French armor. I think with all that help I could do a water-color or so." "You're going to do her in oil," declared his aunt, stoutly. "I am? Then I must have that table, sure. And a nargileh. And a dozen Japanese swords, if you happen to have them about the place. And what else?--oh yes; a small bit of canvas, now I think of it." Bertie looked round once more, and divined herself under discussion. She sidled away, past a long row of landscapes and marines, and drifted out into the hall, where she leaned over the balustrade and studied the mosaics of the vestibule below. "Good little subject," said one of the students, looking after her. He ran a sudden hand upward through his hair, which had lately fallen from its high estate and had come to look like the hair of anybody else. "Get that profile against a red plush curtain--" "And drape her in a red silk kimono or something." "And have a vase of Jacqueminots to one side--a study in reds, you know." "Yes, I know, you know." He turned on his heel. "Well, this ain't work, or anything like it. Come along up-stairs." And up-stairs they went--through the main hallway. Lydia Rhodes followed her protegee with a fond eye. "You know, Truesdale, that she's just the sweetest little thing in the world." "Oh, yes, I know." "Why don't you go into the business?" asked his aunt, impulsively, as she placed a cajoling hand upon his arm. "The business? So I might. Well, you may pay me a hundred dollars for this commission, if you like!" "You know what I mean--your father's business. Now that they are making it all over, they might easily find a place for you." "Um," observed Truesdale, falling into a gloomy and chilling reserve. His aunt saw the necessity of abandoning this new ground at once. "You'll take pains, won't you?" she said, struggling back to her former position. "You'll make it as nice as you can?" "Well, it will be a sort of sketch, of course," said Truesdale, still rather coldly. "It won't, either," insisted his aunt; "it will be a real, regular picture." "She'd get tired of it. Do you think it's any fun to pose?"