“My dear madam! You will read them?”
“Ahem! I will make poor Rich read them.”
“But, madam, he has rejected them.”
“That is the first step. Reading them comes after, when it comes at all. What have you got in that green baize?”
“In this green baize?”
“Well, in this green baize, then.”
“Oh madam! nothing—nothing! To tell the truth, it is an adventurous attempt from memory. I saw you play Silvia, madam; I was so charmed, that I came every night. I took your face home with me—forgive my presumption, madam—and I produced this faint adumbration, which I expose with diffidence.”
So then he took the green baize off.
The color rushed into her face; she was evidently gratified. Poor, silly Mrs. Triplet was doomed to be right about this portrait.
“I will give you a sitting,” said she. “You will find painting dull faces a better trade than writing dull tragedies. Work for other people's vanity, not your own; that is the art of art. And now I want Mr. Triplet's address.”