'I had my usual half-yearly letter from Cuningham yesterday. He's the fellow for telling you the news. Welby has begun a big picture of Marie Antoinette, at Trianon, and has taken a studio in Versailles for the winter.'
Fenwick turned away and began to pace the bare floor of the studio.
'I didn't know,' he said, evidently discomposed.
'By the way, I have often meant to ask you. I trust he wasn't mixed up in the "hanging" affair?' said Watson, with a quick look at his companion.
'He was ill the day it was done, but in my opinion he behaved in an extremely mean and ungenerous manner afterwards!' exclaimed Fenwick, suddenly flushing from brow to chin.
'You mean he didn't support you?'
'He shilly-shallied. He thought—I have very good reason to believe—that I had been badly treated—that there was personal feeling in the matter—resentment of things that I had written—and so on but he would never come out into the open and say so!'
The excitement with which Fenwick spoke made it evident that Watson had touched an extremely sore point.
Watson was silent a little, lit another cigarette, and then said, with a smile:
'Poor Madame de Pastourelles!'