Twenty minutes later they were at table, and the great Russian lady was telling her lover how she had won her husband's consent that she should leave St. Petersburg. When she ended by telling him that she was about to become a mother, and that she wished to bring into the world while near him this child, whose father he was, there was a renewal of fervid tenderness between them.
They determined what their mode of life should be thenceforward, beginning with the next day. Every evening they would dine together, and when they did not remain at the hotel they would go to the theater.
Lise Olsdorf knew nothing of Paris but what she had heard from her countrymen. She was eager to see it, leaning on Paul's arm. Then she would keep him company in his studio, for he must work and grow famous. And, then, he had to paint this portrait of her which she had refused to pose for at St. Petersburg, and the idea made her thrill voluptuously.
What had seemed impossible to her in Russia was quite simple in France. At Paris was not she his alone and entirely? What did she care now for the world! What had she to fear? Who could say whether she would ever return to the banks of the Neva! He must introduce her, too, to his family. She wanted to be loved by all whom Paul loved. Oh, trust her to charm the ladies of his family. She knew how to win a mother's heart, she said, with an air of profound conviction; it was through her children. Now she would only give his little niece a week to be desperately in love with her.
Paul, who had listened to these plans with as much pride as joy, had not the courage to protest against the long visits the princess meant to pay him; so that next day, when she came to him in the Boulevard Clichy at the hour she had appointed, he was all the time in a state of alarm. He had, indeed, told Sarah that he expected some strangers, and that he would be glad if she would not come as usual, but, all the same, he dreaded the curiosity of the young girl, who, perhaps, would not guess how compromising her presence there might be.
However, Sarah did not come this day, and the princess, untroubled by an appearance that would assuredly have aroused her suspicions, could examine at her ease the studio which the painter had spent pains in adorning. Unhappily, the artistic things it contained were not many. Here and there were a few indifferent pictures, presents from friends, some sketches, some plaster casts, and, in the middle of the room, on an easel with dark-colored drapery, the portrait of the mistress of Pampeln.
It was what Lise Olsdorf's eyes first fell on. Full of gratitude and love she sunk into her lover's arms, saying, passionately:
"You were waiting, were you not, to paint the other?"
"The other" was the portrait that the painter had sketched at the château, and the princess had not dared to let him finish.
What most struck the artist's mistress, however, was the want of elegance in the studio.