“You know, I suppose, that I am going to be engaged at Hovel’s. Uncle Verstraeten has arranged it for me.”
Hovel was a barrister, and as Paul had, at a somewhat early age, and after a period of alternate studying and idleness, passed the law examination, Uncle Verstraeten thought he would be doing the young barrister a good turn if he recommended him to his friend. [[25]]It had therefore been arranged that Paul should continue working at Hovel’s office, until he could go in practice for himself.
“At Hovel’s? A very nice man; I like his wife very much. Oh, that will be splendid, Paul.”
“I hope so.”
“But still, if I were a man I should try and become famous. Come, Ben, don’t be troublesome now; go and look at the nice pictures on the floor. Wouldn’t you think it splendid to be famous? Really, if I weren’t Eline Vere I should become an actress.” And she gave vent to a series of brilliant shakes, which fell from her lips like a sparkling chain of diamonds.
“Famous!” and with a contemptuous shrug of the shoulders. “What a silly idea, to be sure. Famous! No; I don’t want to be famous, not a bit. But for all that I should like to paint well, or sing well, or something.”
“Then why don’t you take lessons, either in painting or music? Shall I speak to my master?”
“No, thanks; not that old growler of a Roberts, if I can help it. And besides, Eline, it isn’t really worth while; I should never be able to keep it up whatever it was. I am subject to sudden fits, you see. Then I think I can do anything, then I am anxious to hit upon some great subject for a picture——”
“Like papa,” she interrupted with a sad smile.
“At other times the fit moves me to make the most of what voice I have; but before long all those grand ideas have died their own death of sheer inanition, and then I continue in the same old jog-trot as before.”