'How?' he said. 'Yet, Master, have you not told us that between the darkness and the light there exists an intermediary, something which participates in both, and is, as it were, bright shadow and dark light. Then, between truth and lie—but no, 'tis absurd. Master, your metaphor lands me in great temptation! For the painter who, you say, seeks enslaving charm in the compounding of light and shadow, may rightly seek also the twilight between true and false.'
At first Leonardo frowned, and seemed indignant that one of his pupils should exhibit such an obsession; then he replied smiling:—
'Tempt me not! Get thee behind me, Satan!'
I had expected a different answer; to my thinking, Cesare's words merited better than an idle jest. In me, at any rate they excited a tumult of strange and tormenting ideas.
To-night I beheld him, standing in the rain in a close and fetid alley, absorbed in the contemplation of certain spots of dampness on a stone. He stood there a long while, and the urchins in the street nudged each other and mocked him. I asked him what he beheld in the stone.
'Giovanni,' he said, 'see the splendid monstrous figure! Chimera, with her jaws wide; and beside her an angel with flying hair and airy flight, fleeing from the monster. The caprice of chance has produced a picture worthy of a great artist.'
He traced with his finger the outline of the damp spot, and to my amazement I recognised that what he said was true.
'Many,' he said, 'think this habit of mine an absurdity; but experience has taught me how useful it is for the education of the fancy. I have taken from such things what I wanted, and brought them to completeness. Listen to far-off bells; you can find in their confused clang the very names and words you lack.'