My glance fell full on it, and I saw distinctly what it was--a full-
length figure of the danseuse Faina. Traditionally, perhaps, I ought
to have flung it into the fire--any way the grate--or torn it up.
But I am not fond of throwing other, people's things into the fire,
nor of tearing them up, simply because they offend my own views. He
had no right, perhaps, to thrust it upon me as he had, but that fact
would not, in my opinion, constitute my right to destroy it. So I
merely laid it on the mantelpiece.
"Extraordinary thing! Where did you pick that up?"
"Faina sent it to you with her love, and an invitation to supper to-
night after the last 'turn,'" replied Howard, rolling a cigarette,
sticking it with his lips, and looking at me over it.
"Oh! really? "I said, drily.
"Why, Victor, you've quite coloured up!" said Howard with a sort of
derisive triumph.
I felt I had. Why? I can hardly say. The word "love," the sudden
view of the portrait, dashed, whirling headlong over each other,
through my brain, followed by a sort of hazy cloud, out of which
looked two azure eyes.
"She is very lovely, isn't she?" Howard remarked affectionately,
setting the card upright against the wall.
"Very--in her own way," I assented.
I admitted it willingly, with pleasure. Why not?--an evident fact.
The blue slime in a blocked gutter of the road is very lovely also.
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