The artist smiled, and said, interrupting his pupil:—
“My reputation? Why, in a few days my picture will make it at the Exposition.”
“That relates to your talent,” replied the girl. “I am speaking of your morality. Those young ladies have told their mothers that Luigi was shut up here, and that you lent yourself—to—our love.”
“There is some truth in that, mademoiselle,” replied the professor. “The mothers of those young ladies are foolish women; if they had come straight to me I should have explained the matter. But I don’t care a straw about it! Life is short, anyhow.”
And the painter snapped his fingers above his head. Luigi, who had heard part of the conversation, came in.
“You have lost all your scholars,” he cried. “I have ruined you!”
The artist took Luigi’s hand and that of Ginevra, and joined them.
“Marry one another, my children,” he said, with fatherly kindness.
They both dropped their eyes, and their silence was the first avowal they had made to each other of their love.
“You will surely be happy,” said Servin. “There is nothing in life to equal the happiness of two beings like yourselves when bound together in love.”