Page:The Tragic Muse (London & New York, Macmillan & Co., 1890), Volume 3.djvu/220

212 "Oh, my solitude will be mitigated—I shall have models and people."

"What people—what models?" Miriam asked, before the glass, arranging her hat.

"Well, no one so good as you."

"That's a prospect!" the girl laughed; "for all the good you've got out of me!"

"You're no judge of that quantity," said Nick, "and even I can't measure it just yet. Have I been rather a brute? I can easily believe it; I haven't talked to you—I haven't amused you as I might. The truth is, painting people is a very absorbing, exclusive occupation. You can't do much to them besides."

"Yes, it's a cruel honour."

"Cruel—that's too much," Nick objected.

"I mean it's one you shouldn't confer on people you like, for when it's over it's over: it kills your interest in them and after you've finished them you don't like them any more."

"Surely I like you," Nick returned, sitting tilted back, before his picture, with his hands in his pockets.

"We've done very well: it's something not to have quarrelled," said Miriam, smiling at him now and seeming more in it. "I wouldn't have had you slight your work—I wouldn't have had you do it badly. But there's no fear of that for you," she went on. "You're the real thing and the rare bird. I haven't lived with you this way without seeing that: you're the sincere artist so much more than I. No, no, don't protest," she added, with one of her sudden fine transitions to a deeper tone. "You'll do things that will hand on