Naturally, on varnishing day he was at the Palais de l'Industrie. Not without a certain excitement, he wandered up the great steps between painters, journalists, models, and curious ones. Three times he made the rounds through all the rooms seeking her picture, and as yet he had not found it. But there! Was not that the picture almost concealed by a crowd of admirers and critics? Nikolai found his way through and gazed at the picture. It hung on the middle of the wall, on the line.
For Nikolai naturally the whole Salon was a mere trifle to her picture, and if the admiration of others was of no such large dimension, the success of the picture was still great, decisive.
And Nikolai sat down opposite the picture, listened to every word, every enthusiastic expression, and imprinted them upon his memory so as to tell them to her. He waited for her. She would surely come in the course of the day to see her work. The crowd had not diminished. A critic took notes of it, a painter, with nose close to the canvas, made gestures expressive of his delight at the drawing.
Then Nikolai heard a step, looked round--yes, there she was, tall, slender, with the proud carriage of her head, and her never-to-be-forgotten eyes. The gloomy shadow was still in her eyes, the shadow which never left them. Nevertheless, she enjoyed her triumph, and it became her. She bore it modestly, but still as if it were perfectly natural.
Nikolai had never seen her so charming. She wore a simple, soft, clinging woollen dress, a little bonnet fastened under her chin.
He sprang up. "An immense success," cried he to her. She laid her finger on her lips.
"Please hush, I have no wish to assemble a court of journalists and colleagues about me!" said she in Russian. She spoke in Russian sometimes, and it always pleased Colia to hear her attempt his dearly loved mother tongue.
Then one of the men turned round from her picture. He was a famous critic who knew her. "C'est elle," whispered he to the others. Bowing deeply, he stepped up to her and asked if he might introduce several of her particular admirers.
She could not refuse. She was surrounded. Nikolai remained respectfully in the background and watched her. At length she freed herself. He came up to her again.
"Why are you laughing?" she asked him, quite vexedly.