'I will do what you command me,' he replied meekly. He had, indeed, resolved with all his might and main that the rupture should be made; but, as yet, he had not made it.
'Get paper, then, and write.'
He obeyed, and sat down. 'What shall I say?' he asked.
'Write: "After four years of slavery, I mean to become a man once more. Our compact is over. You shall no longer put your name to my works; and I will no longer share in the infamy of this fraud. Find, if you can, some other starving painter, and buy him. I have torn up your cheque, and I am now at work on a picture which will be my own. If there is any awkwardness about the subject and the style, in connection with the name upon it, that awkwardness will be yours, not mine." So—will you read it aloud? I think,' said Armorel, 'that it will do. He will probably come here and bluster a little. He may even threaten. He may weep. You will—Roland—are you sure—you will be adamant?'
'I swear, Armorel! I will be true to my promise.'
Armorel heaved a sigh. Would he stand steadfast? He might have much to endure. Would he be able to endure hardness? It is only the very young man who can be happy in a garret and live contentedly on a crust. At twenty-six or twenty-seven, the age at which Roland had now arrived, one is no longer quite so young. The garret is dismal: the crust is insipid, unless there are solid grounds for hope. Yet he had the solid grounds of improved work—good work.
'Should you be afraid of him?' she asked.
'Afraid of him?' Roland laughed. 'Why, I never meet him but I curse him aloud. Afraid of him? No. I have never been afraid of anything but of becoming penniless. Poverty—destitution—is an awful spectre. And not only poverty but—I confess, with shame——'
'Oh! man of little faith'—she did not want to hear the end of that confession—'you could not endure a single hour. You did this awful thing for want of money.'
'I did,' said Roland, meekly.