Oh, yes, they are all alike, these painters!
"What is serious, what is not serious?" answered Caffiard. "It is all a matter of opinion. One prefers to have his painting glued to the wall of the Salon, next the ceiling, another to have his drawing on the front page of La Blague."
"Oh, naturally La Blague," protested Pierre.
"I am its editor," said Caffiard superbly.
"Eigh!" exclaimed Pierre. For Mimi had cruelly pinched his arm. Before the sting had passed, she was seated at Caffiard's side, tugging at the strings of a great portfolio.
"Are they imbeciles, these painters, monsieur?" she was saying. "Now you shall see. This great baby is marvelous, but marvelous, with his caricatures. Not Léandre himself—it is I who assure you, monsieur!—and to hear him, one would think—but thou tirest me, Pierrot!—With his portraits! No, it is too much!"
She spread the portfolio wide, and began to shuffle through the drawings it contained.
Caffiard's eyes glistened as he saw them. Even in her enthusiasm, Mimi had not overshot the mark. They were marvelous indeed, these caricatures, mere outlines for the most part, with a dot, here and there, of red, or a little streak of green, which lent them a curious, unusual charm. The subjects were legion. Here was Loubet, with a great band of crimson across his shirt bosom, here Waldeck-Rousseau, with eyes as round and prominent as agate marbles, or Yvette, with a nose on which one might have hung an overcoat, or Chamberlain, all monocle, or Wilhelmina, growing out of a tulip's heart, and as pretty as an old print, with her tight-fitting Dutch cap and broidered bodice. And then a host of types—cochers, grisettes, flower women, camelots, Heaven knows what not!—the products of half a hundred idle hours, wherein great-hearted, foolish Pierre had builded better than he knew!
Caffiard selected five at random, and then, from a waistcoat pocket that clung as closely to his round figure as if it had been glued thereto, produced a hundred-franc note.
"I must have these for La Blague, monsieur," he said. "Bring me two caricatures a week at my office in the rue St. Joseph, and you shall be paid at the same rate. It is not much, to be sure. But you will have ample time left for your—for your portrait-painting, monsieur!"