‘You see? Then I send this Armour. Look!’ Mr. Kauffer continued with rising excitement, baited apparently by the unfortunate canvas to which he pointed, ‘when Armour go to make that I say you go paint ze Maharajah of Gridigurh spearing ze wild pig. You see what he make?’
‘Well,’ I said, ‘it is a wonderfully spirited, dashing thing, and the treatment of all that cane-brake and jungle grass is superb.’
‘Ze treatment—pardon me, sir, I overboil—do you know which is ze Maharajah?’
‘I can’t say I do.’
‘Neider does he. Ze Maharajah refuse zat picture; he is a good fellow, too. He says it is a portrait of ze pig.’
‘But it is so good,’ I protested, ‘of the pig.’
‘But that does not interest the Maharajah, you onderstand, no. You see this one? Nawab of Kandore on his State elephant.’
No doubt about it,’ I said. ‘I know the Nawab well, the young scoundrel. How dignified he looks!’
There was a note of real sorrow in Kauffer’s voice. ‘Dignified? Oh, yes; dignified, but, you observe, also black. The Nawab will not be painted black. At once it is on my hands.’
‘But he is black,’ I remonstrated. ‘He’s the darkest native I’ve ever seen among the nobility.’