His face shadowed at her tone, which seemed to him to betray a feeling the opposite of objection. "Yes," said he—"since I can't do this, I must do something else. I haven't the time to idle about."
She colored at this subtle reflection upon her own devotion to work. All she said was, "At noon to-morrow, then. And I'll be dressed and ready."
When he heard the outer door close Armstrong said, "I understand now why you like him." He was looking at the draped easel with eyes that expressed all he was thinking about Neva, and about Neva and Boris.
"You liked the picture?" she asked.
"Yes," he replied. And there he stopped; his expression made her glance away and color faintly.
"What's the trouble?" she inquired with friendly satire. "Have you lost a few dollars?"
He lowered his head. "Don't," he said humbly. "Please—not to-day."
As he sat staring at the floor and looking somewhat shorn, yet a shorn Samson, she watched him, her expression like a veil not thick enough to hide the fact that there is emotion behind it, yet not thin enough to reveal what, or even what kind of, emotion. Presently she went toward the curtain behind which she had put her portrait of Narcisse. "I don't think I've ever shown you any of my work, have I?" said she.
"No, but I've seen—almost everything."
"Why, you never spoke of it."