Barnabas picked up a piece of scarlet silk drapery from the model stand and flung it round the child, who was looking from him to Miss Mason in astonishment. When she was enveloped in its folds he spoke.
“Miss Mason, my child, is not used to seeing little girls in their birthday attire. It surprised her. She has a penchant for petticoats and frocks, to say nothing of stockings. She might, however, be persuaded to paint you draped as you now are. You look, by the way, uncommonly like a scarlet poppy.”
The child looked gravely at Barnabas.
“She not paint se altogezzer?” she demanded.
“Precisely. She does not paint what the immortal Trilby termed ‘the altogether,’ which phrase you have just made your own.”
The child nodded her head.
“Mais, oui. Some peoples zey do not. I hear Monsieur Thiery say one time it toute à fait extraordinaire zat some peoples ’shamed to look at ze greatest ’andiwork of God. I did not know, me, zat ze peoples who live in ze vrais ateliers zey tink it shame.”
“We all have our little prejudices,” said Barnabas lightly. “Naked little girls is apparently one of Miss Mason’s.”
He smiled whimsically at that lady.
“Shall we paint this infant?” he asked her. “Can the woolly jackets be put on one side, and may I fetch my palette?”