“Yes,” said Dale to himself again, “Art is my mistress. I have betrayed one, fought clear of the web of another, and now I am free to keep true to the only one I love.”
And all through that visit of the Italian, he worked on with a strange eagerness, till, at what seemed to be the end of an hour at most, his model made a sudden movement.
“I beg your pardon,” he said, “I ought to have told you to rest more often. Stanca?” For he recalled a word meaning fatigued or wearied.
“Si—si,” she said quickly, and pointed to the clock on the mantelpiece, when, to Dale’s astonishment, he saw that the two hours had elapsed, and that his model had quickly resumed her cloak. Then, without a word, she crossed to the door of the inner room, and about a quarter of an hour later emerged, to find him standing back studying his morning’s work.
“Grazie,” he cried, and then pointed to the roughly sketched in figure. “Bravo!” he added, smiling.
She bent her head in a quiet, dignified manner, and raking up another Italian word or two, Armstrong said—
“A rivederia—au revoir.”
“Ah, monsieur speaks French!” she cried in that tongue, but with a very peculiar accent.
“Yes, badly,” he replied, also in French. “That is good; now we can get on better. Can you come to-morrow at the same time?”
“I am at monsieur’s service.”