"You are well out of it, my friend," he said below his breath. "It is not good to be afraid, but it was a short agony. And it is over. You will not be afraid again. You are well out of it. No more prison bars. No more stretching of wings to fly with that may never fly. No more years of servitude for a cruel woman's whim. You are well out of it."
He looked up and met Janet's eyes.
"We are trespassers," he said instantly. "We have taken a mean advantage of your kindness in letting us come in. De Rivaz, I will show you a background for your next picture a few yards further on. Mr Brand knows me," he continued, producing a card in his turn. "We do business together. He is my tenant here. Will you kindly tell him I ventured to bring Mr De Rivaz into the remains of his flat to make a sketch of the effects of fire?"
"I will tell him," said Janet, only half attending, and laying the card beside De Rivaz'. Would they never go?
They did go immediately, Stephen peremptorily aiding the departure of the painter.
When they were in the next room De Rivaz leaned up against the blackened wall, and said hoarsely: "Vanbrunt, did you see her?"
"Of course I saw her."
"But I must paint her. I must know her. I shall go back and ask her to sit to me."
"You will do no such thing. You will immediately apply yourself to this scene of desolation, or I shall take you away. Look at this charnel-house. What unchained devils have raged in it! It is jealousy made visible. What is the use of a realistic painter like yourself, who can squeeze all romance out of life till the whole of existence is as prosaic as a string of onions; what is the use of a wretched worm like you making one of your horrible portraits of that beautiful, innocent face?"