Page:The Novels and Tales of Henry James, Volume 2 (New York, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1907).djvu/236

THE AMERICAN down the Rhine, and into Holland and Belgium—the regular round. How do you say that in French—the regular round?" Newman asked of Valentin. Mademoiselle Nioche fixed her eyes an instant on their companion, and then with all the candour of her appeal: "I don't understand monsieur when he says so much at once. Would you be so good as to translate?"

"I d rather talk to you out of my own head," Valentin boldly declared.

"No," said Newman gravely, still in his formal French, "you must n't talk to Mademoiselle Nioche, because you say discouraging things. You ought to tell her to work, to persevere."

"And we Parisians, mademoiselle," the young man exclaimed, "are accused of paying hollow compliments and of being false flatterers!"

"Ah, I don't want any compliments," the girl protested, "I want only the cruel truth. But if I did n't know it by this time—!"

"I utter no truth more cruel," Valentin returned, "than that there are probably many things you can do very well."

"Oh, I can at least do this!" And dipping a brush into a clot of red paint she drew a great horizontal daub across her unfinished picture.

"What are you making that mark for?" Newman asked with his impartial interest.

Without answering, she drew another long crimson daub, in a vertical direction, down the middle of her canvas and so in a moment completed the rough indication of a cross. "It's the sign of the cruel truth." 206