"But the m-model——"
"I have wired to Paris. These Barbizon peasants make me tired."
That evening the model arrived—a girl. Within twelve hours Mark was at work. Pynsent posed the girl upon the bank. She sat with her elbows on her knees and her face between her hands, staring helplessly and hopelessly out of an unknown world.
"We'll call it 'Perdue,'" said Pynsent. "The subject is trite, but the treatment will redeem that. I spotted that girl last year in the Rue du Chat qui Peche. Aren't her eyes immense?"
Mark protested in vain. Pynsent ordered him to begin work. In eight days the picture was painted. Pynsent had not laid a brush upon it, but Mark was miserably conscious that his friend's genius informed almost every stroke. For hours Pynsent stood at his side, exhorting and encouraging.
"It's really good," said Pynsent, after he had forbidden his pupil to add another touch.
"But it's not m-m-mine, Pynsent."
"What?"
"I couldn't have p-painted it without you."
"Pooh!"