"I can under no conditions permit you to paint clouds behind the person of the Czar. It might seem to some to have an allegorical meaning, as though our political horizon were threatened with dark clouds."
"But, my dear sir, clouds are necessary to make the figure stand out."
"The Czar stands out by himself! You must paint in a twilight sky for your background."
"Impossible! Light is thrown on to the figures from the other side, where the sun is shining."
"Where is the sun? How are you going to paint it—in what colors? With us the sun shines far more brilliantly than in any other country."
The artist looked round to see which paint-pot he could aim at the Enlightened Counsellor's head. Then a better idea struck him.
"Stop a bit, Herr Counsellor! Here at the feet of the Czar is to be a figure, 'Death Conquered.' Your head will make a capital model. Just let me jot down a sketch of it."
The Counsellor of Enlightenment once more felt his reason staggered. He could not at the moment decide whether it were a compliment or an impertinence that his physiognomy should be perpetuated on one canvas with that of the Czar as "Death Conquered." But his brutish instincts whispered him that it would be doing the Frenchman a service to stand as his model; so he did not do it. Leaving him in the lurch, he passed on to his patron's apartments.
CHAPTER XIV
THE YOUNG HOPEFUL
The Counsellor of Public Enlightenment was just by way of detailing at large to Araktseieff Pushkin's unheard-of outrage upon the censorial red pencil, with all its aggravations, when a young man, unceremoniously bursting open the door of the reception-room of the dread President of Police, appeared upon the scene. The intruder seemed privileged to break in upon him unannounced, whoever might be having audience of the all-powerful statesman. The new-comer was a man of some thirty years of age; his dress the uniform of a colonel in the Life Guards. His features were pleasing and regular, but the expression uneasy, shifty; he never looked the person to whom he was speaking full in the face.