Page:The Tragic Muse (London & New York, Macmillan & Co., 1890), Volume 3.djvu/231

Rh enough of me you must be when you talk of my example!" Nash changed colour slightly at this; it was the first time in Nick's remembrance that he had given a sign of embarrassment. "Vous allez me lâcher, I see it coming; and who can blame you?—for I've ceased to be in the least spectacular. I had my little hour; it was a great deal, for some people don't even have that. I've given you your curious case and I've been generous; I made the drama last for you as long as I could. You'll 'slope,' my dear fellow—you'll quietly slope; and it will be all right and inevitable, though I shall miss you greatly at first. Who knows whether, without you, I shouldn't still have been representing Harsh, heaven help me? You rescued me; you converted me from a representative into an example—that's a shade better. But don't I know where you must be when you're reduced to praising my piety?"

"Don't turn me away," said Nash plaintively; "give me a cigarette."

"I shall never dream of turning you away; I shall cherish you till the latest possible hour. I'm only trying to keep myself in tune with the logic of things. The proof of how I cling is that, precisely, I want you to sit to me."

"To sit to you?" Nick thought his visitor looked a little blank.

"Certainly, for after all it isn't much to ask. Here we are, and the hour is peculiarly propitious—long light days, with no one coming near me, so that I have plenty of time. I had a hope I should have some orders: my younger sister, whom you know and who is a great optimist, plied me with that