Page:The Tragic Muse (London & New York, Macmillan & Co., 1890), Volume 3.djvu/40

32 "Then he won't care for another woman."

"He would try to, and that would produce its effect—its effect on Miriam."

"You talk like an American novel. Let him try, and God keep us all straight." Nick thought, in extreme silence, of his poor little Biddy and hoped—he would have to see to it a little—that Peter wouldn't "try" on her. He changed the subject and before Nash went away took occasion to remark to him—the occasion was offered by some new allusion of the visitor's to the sport he hoped to extract from seeing Nick carry out everything to which he stood committed—that the great comedy would fall very flat, the great incident would pass unnoticed.

"Oh, if you'll simply do your part I'll take care of the rest," said Nash.

"If you mean by doing my part working like a beaver, it's all right," Nick replied.

"Ah, you reprobate, you'll become a fashionable painter, a P. R. A.!" his companion groaned, getting up to go.

When he had gone Nick threw himself back on the cushions of the divan and, with his hands locked above his head, sat a long time lost in thought. He had sent his servant to bed; he was unmolested. He gazed before him into the gloom produced by the unheeded burning out of the last candle. The vague outer light came in through the tall studio window, and the painted images, ranged about, looked confused in the dusk. If his mother had seen him she might have thought he was staring at his father's ghost.