“No. Though my education was not neglected, it was purely commercial. But I have such a marked and delicate feeling for art, that Monsieur Schinner always begged me, when he had finished a piece, to give him my opinion.”
“Just as Molière consulted Laforêt,” said Mistigris.
Not knowing that Laforêt was a servant-girl, Madame Moreau responded with a graceful droop, showing that in her ignorance she regarded this speech as a compliment.
“How is it that he did not propose just to knock off your head?” said Bridau. “Painters are generally on the lookout for handsome women.”
“What is your meaning, pray?” said Madame Moreau, on whose face dawned the wrath of an offended queen.
“In studio slang, to knock a thing off is to sketch it,” said Mistigris, in an ingratiating tone, “and all we ask is to have handsome heads to sketch. And we sometimes say in admiration that a woman’s beauty has knocked us over.”
“Ah, I did not know the origin of the phrase!” replied she, with a look of languishing sweetness at Mistigris.
“My pupil, Monsieur Léon de Lora,” said Bridau, “has a great talent for likeness. He would be only too happy, fair being, to leave you a souvenir of his skill by painting your charming face.”
And Bridau signaled to Mistigris, as much as to say, “Come, drive it home, she really is not amiss!”
Taking this hint, Léon de Lora moved to the sofa by Estelle’s side, and took her hand, which she left in his.
“Oh! if only as a surprise to your husband, madame, you could give me a few sittings in secret, I would try to excel myself. You are so lovely, so young, so charming! A man devoid of talent might become a genius with you for his model! In your eyes he would find—”
“And we would represent your sweet children in our arabesques,” said Joseph, interrupting Mistigris.
“I would rather have them in my own drawing-room; but that would be asking too much,” said she, looking coquettishly at Bridau.
“Beauty, madame, is a queen whom painters worship, and who has every right to command them.”
“They are quite charming,” thought Madame Moreau.—“Do you like driving out in the evening, after dinner, in an open carriage, in the woods?”
“Oh! oh! oh! oh!” cried Mistigris, in ecstatic tones at each added detail. “Why, Presles will be an earthly paradise.”
“With a fair-haired Eve, a young and bewitching woman,” added Bridau.
Just as Madame Moreau was preening herself, and soaring into the seventh heaven, she was brought down again like a kite by a tug at the cord.
“Madame!” exclaimed the maid, bouncing in like a cannon ball.
“Bless me, Rosalie, what can justify you in coming in like this without being called?”
Rosalie did not trouble her head about this apostrophe, but said in her mistress’ ear:
“Monsieur le Comte is here.”
“Did he ask for me?” said the steward’s wife.
“No, madame—but—he wants his portmanteau and the key of his room.”
“Let him have them then,” said she, with a cross shrug to disguise her uneasiness.
“Mamma, here is Oscar Husson!” cried her youngest son, bringing in Oscar, who, as red as a poppy, dared not come forward as he saw the two painters in different dress.
“So here you are at last, boy,” said Estelle coldly. “You are going to dress, I hope?” she went on, after looking at him from head to foot, with great contempt. “I suppose your mother has not brought you up to dine in company in such clothes as those.”
“Oh, no,” said the ruthless Mistigris, “a coming diplomatist must surely have a seat—to his trousers! A coat to dine saves wine.”
“A coming diplomatist?” cried Madame Moreau.
The tears rose to poor Oscar’s eyes as he looked from Joseph to Léon.
“Only a jest by the way,” replied Joseph, who wished to help Oscar in his straits.
“The boy wanted to make fun as we did, and he tried to humbug,” said the merciless Mistigris. “And now he finds himself the ass with a lion’s grin.”
“Madame,” said Rosalie, coming back to the drawing-room door, “his Excellency has ordered dinner for eight persons at six o’clock; what is to be done?”
While Estelle and her maid were holding counsel, the artists and Oscar gazed at each other, their eyes big with terrible apprehensions.
“His Excellency—Who?” said Joseph Bridau.
“Why, Monsieur le Comte de Sérizy,” replied little Moreau.
“Was it he, by chance, in the coucou?” said Léon de Lora.
“Oh!” exclaimed Oscar, “the Comte de Sérizy would surely never travel but in a coach and four.”
“How did he come, madame—the Comte de Sérizy?” the painter asked of Madame Moreau when she came back very much upset.
“I have no idea,” said she. “I cannot account for his coming, nor guess what he has come for.—And Moreau is out!”
“His Excellency begs you will go over to the château, Monsieur Schinner,” said a gardener coming to the door, “and he begs you will give him the pleasure of your company at dinner, as well as Monsieur Mistigris.”
“Our goose is cooked!” said the lad with a laugh. “The man we took for a country worthy in Pierrotin’s chaise was the Count. So true is it that what you seek you never bind.”
Oscar was almost turning to a pillar of salt; for on hearing this, his throat felt as salt as the sea.
“And you! Who told him all about his wife’s adorers and his skin disease?” said Mistigris to Oscar.
“What do you mean?” cried the steward’s wife, looking at the two artists, who went off laughing at Oscar’s face.
Oscar stood speechless, thunderstruck; hearing nothing, though Madame Moreau was questioning him and shaking him violently by one of his arms, which she had seized and clutched tightly; but she was obliged to leave him where he was without having extracted a reply, for Rosalie called her again to give out linen and silver-plate, and to request her to attend in person to the numerous orders given by the Count. The house-servants, the gardeners, everybody on the place, were rushing
