Page:The Strand Magazine (Volume 4).djvu/618

 Mr. Lovell handed his open sketch-book to his friend. It was open at a page on which was a drawing of a woman's face. When Mr. Warren's eyes fell on this drawing, he sat up in his chair with a show of sudden interest.

"Gerald! I say! You'll excuse my saying so, but I didn't think you were capable of anything so good as this. Do you know that this is the best drawing of yours I have ever seen, young man?"

"I believe it is."

"It looks to me—I don't want to flatter you; goodness knows you've conceit enough already!—but it looks to me as though it were a genuine bit of inspiration."

"Joking apart, it seems to me almost as if it were an inspiration."

"I wish an inspiration of the same kind would come to me. I'd be considerably grateful even for a nightmare. Do you know what I should do with this? I should use it for a picture."

"I thought of doing something of the kind myself."

"Just a study of a woman's face. And you might call it—the title would be apposite—'A Vision of the Night!

"A good idea. I will."

And Mr. Lovell did. When he returned to his Chelsea studio, he chose a moderate-sized canvas, and he began to paint on it a woman's face—just a woman's face, and nothing more. She was looking a little downwards, as a woman might look who was about to stoop to kiss someone lying asleep in bed—say a sleeping child—and she glanced from the canvas with laughing eyes. Mr. Warren came in to look at it several times while it was progressing. When it was finished, he regarded it for some moments in silent contemplation.

"I call that," he declared, sententiously, with what he supposed, perhaps erroneously, to be a Yankee twang, "a gen-u-ine work of art. I do. The thing. Young man, if you forward that, with your compliments, or without 'em, to the President, Fellows, and Associates of the Royal Academy, I'll bet you five to one it's hung!"

His prediction was verified—it was hung. It was the first of Mr. Lovell's pictures which ever had been hung—which made the fact none the less gratifying to Mr. Lovell. It was hung very well, too, considering. And it attracted quite a considerable amount of attention in its way. It was sold on the opening day. That fact was not displeasing to Mr. Lovell.

One morning, about the middle of June, a card was brought in to Mr. Lovell, while he was working in his studio. On it was inscribed a name—Vicomte d'Humières. The card was immediately followed by its owner, a tall, slightly built gentleman; unmistakably a foreigner. He saluted Mr. Lovell with a bow which was undoubtedly Parisian.

"Mr. Gerald Lovell?"

The accent was French, but, for a Frenchman, the English was fair.

"I am Gerald Lovell."

"Ah! That is good! You are a gentleman, Mr. Lovell, whom I particularly wish to see." The stranger had been carrying his stick in one hand and his hat in the other. These he now deposited upon one chair; himself he placed upon a second—uninvited. He crossed his legs. He folded his black gloved hands in front of him. "I believe, Mr. Lovell, that we are not strangers—you and I."

Mr. Lovell glanced at the card which he still was holding.