“I must paint you, Miss Berber,” was Stefan's comment.
“All the artists say that.” She waved a faint expostulation.
Her hands, he thought, had the whiteness and consistency of a camelia.
“All the artists are not I, however,” he answered with a smiling shrug.
“Greek meets Greek,” thought Constance, amused, turning away to other guests.
“I admit that.” Miss Berber lit another cigarette. “I have seen your Danaë. The people who have painted me have been fools. Obvious—treating me like an advertisement for cold cream.”
She breathed a sigh, and sank again to the sofa. Her lids drooped as if in weariness of such banalities. Stefan sat beside her, the manner of both eliminating the surrounding group.
“One must have subtlety, must one not?” she murmured.
How subtle she was, he thought; how mysterious, in spite of her obvious posing! He could not even tell whether she was interested in him.
“I shall paint you, Miss Berber,” he said, watching her, “as a Nixie. Water creatures, you know, without souls.”