“Why, he looks like a young viking.” Somehow he made me think of my father, in coloring and the northern type of face, but this man had a more distinct personality that seemed almost to strike one. Papa was gentle and a dreamer. Bonnat was vitally alive.
“Mr. Fisher told me you wanted a model.”
He nodded and his big glance, still smiling, looked me over.
“Come in, come in.”
He was about twenty-six or seven, and in spite of the two hundred pounds Menna told me he weighed, he was not the least bit fat.
I was now in the room, and I glanced about me. Never have I seen such an untidy room in my life. It was not dirty, but simply littered up with things.
“Sit down,” he said, sweeping off some drawings and papers on to the floor from a chair that was loaded. There was also a glass of water on the chair, and he tipped that off, too, and the water ran on the floor.
“Oh,” I gasped, “do you always throw everything on the floor like that?”
“Not everything,” he answered, grinning. Then he handed me a box of cigarettes. I took one, and he began to look for a match. On the couch, the table and on all the chairs were piled papers, paints, brushes, clothes, boots and all manner of articles. It looked as if he never put anything where it belonged. Even his clothes were not hung up. On the walls were sketches, paintings, a pair of fencing swords, and the floor could scarcely be seen, as it also was covered with articles, and there were boxes of cigarette stumps and several empty glasses and bottles. As he hunted for the matches, he tumbled one thing after another on the floor.
I was possessed with a desire to tidy up that room. My hands were literally itching to go to work upon it. He seemed so helpless among all his belongings.