The Tiger Lily. George Manville Fenn
those from Mr. Dale, have you not?” she said at last, in a rich, soft voice.
“Yes, my lady. I ’ave, my lady. The heasel and canvas, my lady.”
“Perhaps you had better bring them into this room.”
“Yes, my lady—of course, my lady,” said the model eagerly, as he blundered after the Contessa, “The Emperor’s” rather shambling movements, being due to a general looseness of joint, in no wise according with the majesty of his head and face.
“Yes; about there. That will do; they are sure to be moved.”
“Oh yes, my lady, on account of the light. Mr. Dale’s very partickler.”
“Indeed? Will he be here soon?”
“Direc’ly, I should say, my lady. He bordered me to bring on his traps.”
“From his studio?” said the lady, sinking into a chair, and taking a purse from a little basket on a table.
“The Emperor’s” eyesight was very good, and the movement suggested pleasant things. The lady, too, seemed disposed to question him, and he winked to himself mentally, as he glanced at the beautiful face before him, thought of his employer’s youth and good looks, and then had sundry other thoughts, such as might occur to a man of a very ordinary world.
But his hands were not idle; they were as busy as his thoughts, and he spread the legs of the easel, and altered the position of the pegs ready for the canvas.
“Will you take this—for your trouble?” came in that soft, rich, thrilling voice.
“Oh no—thank you, my lady—that ain’t necessary,” said the man hastily, as his fingers closed over the coin extended with a smile by fingers glittering with jewels.—“A suv, by jingo,” he added to himself.
“Are you Mr. Dale’s servant?”
“No, ma’am—my lady. Oh, dear, no. An old friend—that is, you know, I sit for him—and stand. I’m in a many of his pictures.”
“Oh, I see. He takes your portrait?”
“Well, no, my lady; portraits is quite another line. I meant for his gennery pictures.”
“Genre?”
“Yes, my lady. I was standing for Crackticus that day when you and his lordship come to the studio.”
“Indeed? I did not see you.”
“No, my lady. I had to go into the next room. You see I was a hancient Briton, and not sootable for or’nary society ’cept in a picture.—I think that’ll do, my lady. He’ll alter it to his taste.”
“Yes, but—er—does Mr. Dale paint many portraits of ladies?” said the Contessa, detaining the model as he made as if to depart.
“Oh no, my lady. I never knew him do such a thing afore. He never works away from his studio, and he went on a deal about having to come here—er—that is—of course, he did not know,” added the man hastily.
The Contessa smiled.
“But he has painted the human countenance a great deal? I mean the faces of ladies. There were several of nymphs in his Academy picture this year—beautiful women.”
“The Emperor” smiled and shook his head.
“On’y or’nary models, my lady. He made ’em look beautiful. That’s art, my lady.”
“Then he had sitters for that picture?” she asked, rather eagerly.
“Oh yes, my lady; but Lor’ bless you! it isn’t much you’d think of them. He’s a doing a picture now—a tayblow about Juno making a discovery over something. Her good man wasn’t quite what he ought to have been, my lady, and she’s in a reg’lar rage.”
“Indeed?”
“Yes, my lady; and he tried all the reg’lar lady models—spent no end on ’em, but they none of ’em wouldn’t do.”
“Not beautiful enough?”
“He didn’t think so, my lady, though, as I told him, it was too much to expeck to get one as was perfeck. You see in art, to make our best studies, we has to do a deal of patching.”
“Painting the picture over and over again?”
“Your ladyship does not understand. It’s like this: many of our best tayblows of goddesses and nymphs is made up. One model does for the face, another for the arms and hands, another for busties and—I beg your ladyship’s pardon; I was only talking art.”
“I understand. I take a great deal of interest in the subject.”
“Thankye, my lady. I told Mr. Dale as it was expecting too much to get a perfeck woman for a model, for there wasn’t such a thing in nature. But, all hignorance, my lady, all hignorance. I hadn’t seen your ladyship then. I beg your ladyship’s pardon for being so bold.”
“The Emperor” had seen the dreamy dark eyes open wide and flash angrily, but the look changed back to the listless, half-contemptuous again, and the lady said with a smile—
“Granted.—That will do. I suppose you will fetch Mr. Dale’s easel when it is removed?”
“I hope so, my lady, and thank you kindly. So generous! Never forget it, and—oh! I beg your pardon, sir.”
“The Emperor” had been backing toward the door, and nearly came in contact with a short, slight, carefully dressed, middle-aged man—that is to say, he was about forty-five, looked sixty-five the last thing at night, and as near thirty-five as his valet could make him in the day.
He gazed keenly at the noble features of the man who towered over him, and “The Emperor” returned the gaze, noting, from a professional point of view, the rather classic Italian mould of the features, disfigured by a rather weak sensual mouth, and dark eyes too closely set.
“Two sizes larger, and what a Yago he would have made to my Brabantio,” muttered “The Emperor,” as he was let out by one of the footmen; and at the same moment Armstrong Dale, artist, strode up—a manly, handsome, carelessly dressed, typical Saxon Englishman in appearance, generations of his family, settled in America since the Puritan days, having undergone no change.
“Traps all there, Jaggs?”
“Yes, sir, everything,” said the man confidentially, “and oh! sir—”
“That will do. Say what you have to say when I return: I’m late. Take my card up to the Contessa,” he continued, turning sharply to the servant; and there was so much stern decision in his manner that the door was held wide, and the artist entered.
Meanwhile a few words passed in the drawing-room.
“Who’s that fellow, Tina?” said the man too small, in “The Emperor’s” estimation, for Iago.
The Contessa had sunk back in her lounge, and a listless, weary air had come over her face like a cloud, as she said, with a slight shrug of her shoulders—
“Mr. Dale’s man.”
“Who the dickens is Mr. Dale?”
Twenty years of life in London society had so thoroughly Anglicised Conte Cesare Dellatoria, that his conversation had become perfectly insular, and the Italian accent was only noticeable at times.
“You know—the artist whom we visited.”
“Oh, him! I’d forgotten. That his litter?”
“Yes.”
“Humph! I haven’t much faith in English artists. Better have waited till we went to Rome in the winter. Why, Tina, you look lovely this morning. That dress suits you exactly, beloved one.”