'You did well,' he rejoined, 'very well! Pardon my emotion—may I wring that hand?'
It is not my practice to shake hands with a photographer, but I was touched and gratified by his boyish enthusiasm, and he seemed a gentlemanly young fellow too, so I made an exception in his favour; and he did wring my hand—hard.
'So you are Vitriol?' he repeated in a kind of daze, 'and you have sought me out—me, of all people in the world—to have the honour of taking your photograph!'
'That is so,' I said, 'but pardon me if I warn you that you must not allow your head to be turned by what is, in truth, due to the merest accident.'
'But what an accident!' he cried; 'after what I have learnt I really could not think of making any charge for this privilege!'
That was a creditable and not unnatural impulse, and I did not check it. 'You shall take me as often as you please,' I said, 'and for nothing.'
'And may I,' he said, a little timidly—'would you give me permission to exhibit the results?'
'If I followed my own inclinations,' I replied, 'I should answer "certainly not." But perhaps I have no right to deprive you of the advertisement, and still less to withhold my unworthy features from public comment. I may, for private reasons,' I added, thinking of Iris, 'find it advisable to make some show of displeasure, but you need not fear my taking any proceedings to restrain you.'
'We struggling photographers must be so careful,' he sighed. 'Suppose the case of your lamented demise—it would be a protection if I had some written authority under your hand to show your legal representatives.'
'Actio personalis moritur cum personâ,' I replied; 'if my executors brought an action, they would find themselves non-suited.' (I had studied for the Bar at one period of my life.)