Page:In a winter city, by Ouida.djvu/235

 ; since that clever but idle young gentleman, having been pre-paid half the sum agreed on for the fresco-painting, had been spending it joyously after the tastes of young artists, assisted by a pretty brown actress of the Folies Marigny, and had not at that moment even begun to touch the walls and the ceiling of the ball-room confided to his genius.

"But you had better begin, though she is not coming back," said the good Hubert, surveying the blank waste of prepared plaster. "Miladi is not often out of temper, but when she is, ouf! I would as soon serve a Russian. Better begin; paint your best, because she knows—Miladi knows, and she is hard to please in those things. Not but what I dare say, as soon as you have done it all, she will take it into her head that it looks too cold, or looks too warm, or will not compose well, or something or other, and will cover it all up with silk and satin. But that will not matter to you."

"Not at all," said Monsieur Camille, who, though he had been a pupil of Flandrin, had learned nothing of that true master's