Page:Tex; a chapter in the life of Alexander Teixeira de Mattos (IA texchapterinlife00mcke).pdf/50

 wonder how Tenniel could have drawn the old sheep in Alice Through the Looking-Glass without Teixeira as a model. Tall and broad-shouldered, with thick black hair and a white face, tortoise-shell-rimmed spectacles, and a cigarette in a holder, taciturn, impassive and unsmiling, Teixeira never failed to conceal that he was more shy than his visitor. With articulation as beautifully clear as his writing and in words not less exquisitely chosen than the language of his books, he would introduce the newcomer to those with whom he was to work. Messengers would be despatched to bring an additional chair and table. In the resultant confusion, the immense, silent figure would walk away with a heavy tread, to find that a pile of papers, two feet high, had risen like an Indian mango where there had been but six inches a moment before. A voice of authority, rolling its r's like the rumble of distant artillery, would telephone for more messengers; in time the pile would dwindle until the spectacles and then the nose and then the cigarette-holder were visible. In time, too, the newcomer re-