“You won’t be ashamed of yourself,” prophesied the other, “if you do just as I say, quickly and naturally.”

“Oh, naturally,” retorted the girl in an indignant whimper.  “I suppose you think that’s natural.  Anyway, he probably doesn’t care about me at all that way.”

“Roberta,” said the sculptress sternly, “did you see his portrait of you?”

“Y-y-yes.”

“And you have the presumption to say that he doesn’t care?  Why, that picture doesn’t simply tell his secret.  It yells it!”

“I don’t care,” said the hard-pressed Bobbie.  “It hasn’t yelled it to me. Nobody’s yelled it to me.  And I c-c-can’t ask a m-m-man to—­to—­”

“Perhaps you can’t,” allowed her adviser magnanimously.  “On second thought, it won’t be necessary.  You just go back—­after powdering your nose a little—­and say that you’ve come to see the picture once more, or that it’s a fine day, or that competition is the life of trade, or that—­oh, anything!  And, if he doesn’t do the rest, I’ll kill and eat him.”

“But, Cecily—­”

“You would be a patroness of Art.  Now I’ve given you something real to patronize.  Don’t you dare fail me.”  Suddenly the speaker gave herself over to an access of mirth.  “Heaven help that young man when he comes to own up.”

“Own up to what?”

“Never mind.”

Having consumed a vain and repetitious half-hour in variations upon her query, Bobbie gave it up and decided to find out for herself.  It was curiosity and curiosity alone (so she assured herself) that impelled her to return for the last time (she assured herself of that, also) to the attic.

A voice raised in vehement protest, echoing through the open door of the studio, checked her on the landing below as she mounted.

“And you’re actually going to let thirty-five thousand a year slip through your fingers, just to pursue a fad?”

To which Julien’s equable accents replied: 

“That’s it, Merrill.  I’m going to paint.”

The unseen Merrill left a blessing (of a sort) behind, slammed the door upon it, and materialized to the vision of the girl on the landing as an energetic and spruce-looking man of forty-odd, with a harassed expression.  At need, Miss Holland could summon considerable decisiveness to her aid.

“Would you think me inexcusably rude,” she said softly, “if I asked who you are?”

The descending man snatched off his hat, stared, seemed on the point of whistling, then, recovering himself, said courteously:  “I’m George Merrill, advertising manager for the Criterion Clothing Company.”

“And Mr. Tenney has been doing drawings for you?”

“He has.  For several years.”

“So that,” said the girl, half to herself, “is his pot-boiling.”

“Not a very complimentary term,” commented Mr. Merrill, “for the best black-and-white work being done in New York to-day.  Between my concern and two others he makes a railroad president’s income out of it.”