“My lord has been in Rome?” she cried in Italian.
“I think I understand that,” muttered Dale, “and if your form proves to be equal to your quick intelligence, my picture will be painted. Now then, signora, this is a language I dare say you can understand. Here are two half-crowns. For two hours—‘due ore.’”
“Si, si,” she cried eagerly, and she almost snatched the coins and held them to her veiled lips.
“Silver keys to your understanding, madam,” he muttered, taking a mahlstick from where it stood against a chair. “Humph! I begin to be hopeful. Yes, more than hopeful,” he continued, as the model was rapidly drawing off her shabby, carefully mended gloves, before taking a little common portemonnaie from her pocket and dropping the coins in one by one. Then aloud, as he pointed with the mahlstick, “La bella mano.”
“Aha!” she cried quickly. But she gave her shoulders another shrug, and shook the purse, saying sadly—“Pel povero padre.”
”‘Padre.’ For her father,” muttered Dale. “Not so sordid as I thought, poor thing. Will you remove your veil?”
She leaned toward him.
“I said, Will you remove your veil?—Hang it, what is veil in Italian? ‘Velum’ in Latin.”
She was evidently trying hard to grasp his meaning, and at the Latin “velum” she clapped her beautifully formed hands to her veil.
“No, no!” she cried haughtily; and then volubly, in Italian—“I am compelled to do this for bread. I do not know you, neither need you know me. My face is not beautiful, and we are strangers. You wish to paint my figure. I will retain my veil.”