“The landlord has gone away for a holiday, and will return next week.”
Bonnat seemed to think that an immense joke. He said every one in Paresis Row had had some such experience.
He wanted to know where I lived and I told him Fifteenth Street, and then he asked suddenly:
“Alone?” When I answered “yes” he smiled beamingly at me. Then he took me home, and lifting his hat in going, said:
“You’re engaged then. Sunday. Good-bye.” I could see him striding down the street, his head up, and his broad shoulders thrown back. He whistled as he went along.
XLIV
SUNDAY morning was bleak and cold. It had been raining for the last three days, and as I crossed the corner of Eighth Avenue and Fourteenth Street the puddles were so deep that I splashed the mud all over my raincoat. It was cold and chilly when I reached Paul Bonnat’s studio.
There were, besides Fisher and Paul Bonnat, two other men, one named Enfield, who was an illustrator, and a Mr. Christain, who worked as a lithographer on week days and painted in his spare time on Sundays.
When I got in Fisher seized me by the arm, and with a mock of proud gesture he showed me Bonnat’s renovated room:
“Look, Miss Ascough. Can you beat this for a studio de luxe—and all in your honor! Gee! Look at that beautiful pile of rubbish he has swept under the table there, where he thought you wouldn’t see it. He’s trying to impress you with the beauty of his home.”