He could bear it no longer, and again throwing down brushes and palette, he paced the room for a minute or two before turning to the marble figure standing so motionless before him.
“I tell you I cannot paint,” he cried angrily. “It is as if you were casting some spell over me. I must see your face. Why do you persist in this fancy? Your masked countenance takes off my attention. I beg—I insist—remove that veil.”
“I do not quite understand monsieur,” she said coldly. “He speaks in a language that is not mine, neither is it his. He confuses me. I am trying to be a patient model, but everything is wrong to-day. Will he tell me what I should do to give him satisfaction?”
“Take off that veil!” cried Dale.
The model caught up the cloak and flung it around her shoulders.
“Now, quick!” cried Dale excitedly, “that veil!”
“Monsieur is ill. Shall I call for help?”
“No, no, I am not ill. Once more I beg, I pray of you—take off that veil.”
“But monsieur is so strange—so unlike himself,” she cried, as, taking another step forward, Dale caught the hand which held the cloak in his.
“Now!” he cried wildly, with his eyes flashing, and trying to pierce the woollen mask—“that veil!” For a moment the warm soft hand clung to his convulsively, and the other rose with the arm in a graceful movement towards the shrouded face; but, as if angry with herself for being about to yield to his mad importunity, she snatched away the hand he held, and with the other thrust him back violently.