“Princess, will it please you to sit to-day?”

She turned to raise her eyes to his.

“But,” she said, “you do not paint upon the canvas. You have told me so.”

“I am a sculptor, but I have also attempted the other—”

She interrupted him.

“It would hurt your fame,” she said. “It cannot be.”

“And what does it matter whether I have fame or not?”

“Artist, it was not for that work I bade you stay,” she said.

“But it was thought so by the others, princess.”

“I—I had a desire to learn more of—of Kamakura—of people there—and so I begged you to remain.”