“You are so marvelous,” said Jim, “that poor painting chaps ought not to look at you. Oho! I begin to have light. I begin to see where that lilac arrangement and that incredible headpiece came from. By the way, Goose Girl, is it possible that Araminta, Duchess of Dorset, is one of your grand relations?”
“She is my great-grandmamma,” said Miss Perry.
“She must be,” said Jim. “What has old Dame Nature been doing, I wonder? Copying former successes. And old Sir President History, R.A., famous painter of genre, repeating himself like one o’clock.”
Jim Lascelles began to sketch the incredible hat with great vigor and boldness.
“By all the gods of Monsieur Gillet,” said Jim, vaingloriously, “they will want a rail to guard it at the Luxembourg.”
Yet Jim was really a modest young fellow. Could it be that already a phial of the magic potion had been injected into the veins of that sane and amiable youth?
“Goose Girl,” said Jim, “it is quite clear to me that if the Duchess was your great-grandmamma, Thomas Gainsborough, R.A., was my old great-granddad. Now, don’t move the Goose Piece. She wear-eth a mar-vel-ous hat!” Jim’s charcoal was performing surprising antics. “Chin Piece quite still. Wonderful natural angle. Can you keep good if you take your paw out of your mouth?”
“I will try to,” said Miss Perry, with perfect docility.
“We will risk it,” said Jim. “Keep saying to yourself, ‘Only thirty-five minutes more and I get a cream bun.’”
“Yes, Jim,” said Miss Perry, with a remarkable air of intelligence.