“It’s my only extravagance.”

“Do you or do you not maintain a luxurious apartment in Gramercy Park, when you are not down here posing in your attic as an honest working-man?”

“Oh, see here, Mrs. Staten, I won’t stand for that!” he expostulated.  “You know perfectly well I keep my room here because it’s the only place I can work in quietly—­”

“And because Peter Quick Banta would break his foolish old heart if you left him entirely,” supplemented the sculptress.

Julien flushed and stood looking like an awkward child.  “Did you tell all this stuff to Miss Holland?” he asked.

“Oh, no!  She thinks that your pot-boiling is a desperate and barely sufficient expedient to keep the wolf from the door.  So she is planning to help you realize your destiny.”

“Which is?” he queried with lifted brows.

“To be a great painter.”

The other winced.  “As you know, I’ve meant all along, as soon as I’ve saved enough—­”

“Oh, yes; I know,” broke in the Bonnie Lassie, who can be quite ruthless where Art is concerned, “and you know; but time flies and hell is paved with good intentions, and if you want to be that kind of a pavement artist—­well, I think Peter Quick Banta is a better.”

“Do you suppose she’d let me paint her?” he asked abruptly.

If statuettes could blink, the one upon which the Bonnie Lassie was busied would certainly have shrouded its vision against the dazzling radiance of her smile, for this was coming about as she had planned it from the moment when she had caught the flash of startled surprise and wonder in his eyes, as they first rested on Bobbie Holland.  Here, she had guessed, might be the agency to bring Julien Tenney to his artistic senses; and even so it was now working out.  But all she said was—­and she said it with a sort of venomous blandness—­“My dear boy, you can’t paint.”

“Can’t I!  Just because I’m a little out of practice—­”

“Two years, isn’t it, since you’ve touched a palette?”

“Give me a chance at such a model as she is!  That’s all I ask.”

“Do you think her so pretty?” inquired the sculptress disparagingly.

“Pretty?  She’s the loveliest thing that—­” Catching his hostess’s smile he broke off.  “You’ll admit it’s a well-modeled face,” he said professionally; “and—­and—­well, unusual.”

“Pooh!  ‘Dangerous’ is the word.  Remember it,” warned the Bonnie Lassie.  “She’s a devastating whirlwind, that child, and she comes down here partly to get away from the wreckage.  Now, if you play your part cleverly—­”

“I’m not going to play any part.”

“Then it’s all up.  How is a patroness of Art going to patronize you, unless you’re a poor and struggling young artist, living from hand to mouth by arduous pot-boiling?  You won’t have to play a part as far as the pot-boiling goes,” added his monitress viciously.  “Only, don’t let her know that the rewards of your shame run to high-powered cars and high-class apartments.  Remember, you’re poor but honest.  Perhaps she’ll give you money.”