"It came there, and yet I love thee," he said, with a sort of
contrition. "Am I, then, a wretch?"

"Let us consult Pere Hardouin."
"No, no! it must be a secret between us."

"Well, I will go; but thou must not be present," she said. "Stay at
the door, armed with thy dagger. If I cry out, enter and kill the

man."
Forgetting all but his art, Poussin clasped her in his arms.

"He loves me no longer!" thought Gillette, when she was once more
alone.

She regretted her promise. But before long she fell a prey to an
anguish far more cruel than her regret; and she struggled vainly to

drive forth a terrible fear which forced its way into her mind. She
felt that she loved him less as the suspicion rose in her heart that

he was less worthy than she had thought him.
CHAPTER II

Three months after the first meeting of Porbus and Poussin, the former
went to see Maitre Frenhofer. He found the old man a prey to one of

those deep, self-developed discouragements, whose cause, if we are to
believe the mathematicians of health, lies in a bad digestion, in the

wind, in the weather, in some swelling of the intestines, or else,
according to casuists, in the imperfections of our moral nature; the

fact being that the good man was simply worn out by the effort to
complete his mysterious picture. He was seated languidly in a large

oaken chair of vast dimensions covered with black leather; and without
changing his melancholy attitude he cast on Porbus the distant glance

of a man sunk in absolute dejection.
"Well, maitre," said Porbus, "was the distant ultra-marine, for which

you journeyed to Brussels, worthless? Are you unable to grind a new
white? Is the oil bad, or the brushes restive?"

"Alas!" cried the old man, "I thought for one moment that my work was
accomplished; but I must have deceived myself in some of the details.

I shall have no peace until I clear up my doubts. I am about to
travel; I go to Turkey, Asia, Greece, in search of models. I must

compare my picture with various types of Nature. It may be that I have
up THERE," he added, letting a smile of satisfactionflicker on his

lip, "Nature herself. At times I am half afraid that a brush may wake
this woman, and that she will disappear from sight."

He rose suddenly, as if to depart at once. "Wait," exclaimed Porbus.
"I have come in time to spare you the costs and fatigues of such a

journey."
"How so?" asked Frenhofer, surprised.

"Young Poussin is beloved by a woman whose incomparable beauty is
without imperfection. But, my dear master, if he consents to lend her

to you, at least you must let us see your picture."
The old man remained standing, motionless, in a state bordering on

stupefaction. "What!" he at last exclaimed, mournfully. "Show my
creature, my spouse?--tear off the veil with which I have chastely

hidden my joy? It would be prostitution! For ten years I have lived
with this woman; she is mine, mine alone! she loves me! Has she not

smiled upon me as, touch by touch, I painted her? She has a soul,--the
soul with which I endowed her. She would blush if other eyes than mine

beheld her. Let her be seen?--where is the husband, the lover, so
debased as to lend his wife to dishonor? When you paint a picture for

the court you do not put your whole soul into it; you sell to
courtiers your tricked-out lay-figures. My painting is not a picture;

it is a sentiment, a passion! Born in my atelier, she must remain a
virgin there. She shall not leave it unclothed. Poesy and women give

themselves bare, like truth, to lovers only. Have we the model of
Raphael, the Angelica of Ariosto, the Beatrice of Dante? No, we see

but their semblance. Well, the work which I keep hidden behind bolts
and bars is an exception to all other art. It is not a canvas; it is a

woman,--a woman with whom I weep and laugh and think and talk. Would
you have me resign the joy of ten years, as I might throw away a worn-

out doublet? Shall I, in a moment, cease to be father, lover, creator?
--this woman is not a creature; she is my creation. Bring your young

man; I will give him my treasures,--paintings of Correggio, Michael-
Angelo, Titian; I will kiss the print of his feet in the dust,--but

make him my rival? Shame upon me! Ha! I am more a lover than I am a
painter. I shall have the strength to burn my Nut-girl ere I render my

last sigh; but suffer her to endure the glance of a man, a young man,
a painter?--No, no! I would kill on the morrow the man who polluted

her with a look! I would kill you,--you, my friend,--if you did not
worship her on your knees; and think you I would submit my idol to the

cold eyes and stupid criticisms of fools? Ah, love is a mystery! its
life is in the depths of the soul; it dies when a man says, even to

his friend, Here is she whom I love."
The old man seemed to renew his youth; his eyes had the brilliancy and

fire of life, his pale cheeks blushed a vivid red, his hands trembled.
Porbus, amazed by the passionateviolence with which he uttered these

words, knew not how to answer a feeling so novel and yet so profound.
Was the old man under the thraldom of an artist's fancy? Or did these

ideas flow from the unspeakable fanaticism produced at times in every
mind by the long gestation of a noble work? Was it possible to bargain

with this strange and whimsical being?
Filled with such thoughts, Porbus said to the old man, "Is it not

woman for woman? Poussin lends his mistress to your eyes."
"What sort of mistress is that?" cried Frenhofer. "She will betray him

sooner or later. Mine will be to me forever faithful."
"Well," returned Porbus, "then let us say no more. But before you

find, even in Asia, a woman as beautiful, as perfect, as the one I
speak of, you may be dead, and your picture forever unfinished."

"Oh, it is finished!" said Frenhofer. "Whoever sees it will find a
woman lying on a velvet bed, beneath curtains; perfumes are exhaling

from a golden tripod by her side: he will be tempted to take the
tassels of the cord that holds back the curtain; he will think he sees

the bosom of Catherine Lescaut,--a model called the Beautiful Nut-
girl; he will see it rise and fall with the movement of her breathing.

Yet--I wish I could be sure--"
"Go to Asia, then," said Porbus hastily, fancying he saw some

hesitation in the old man's eye.
Porbus made a few steps towards the door of the room. At this moment

Gillette and Nicolas Poussin reached the entrance of the house. As the
young girl was about to enter, she dropped the arm of her lover and

shrank back as if overcome by a presentiment. "What am I doing here?"
she said to Poussin, in a deep voice, looking at him fixedly.

"Gillette, I leave you mistress of your actions; I will obey your
will. You are my conscience, my glory. Come home; I shall be happy,

perhaps, if you, yourself--"
"Have I a self when you speak thus to me? Oh, no! I am but a child.

Come," she continued, seeming to make a violent effort. "If our love
perishes, if I put into my heart a long regret, thy fame shall be the

guerdon of my obedience to thy will. Let us enter. I may yet live
again,--a memory on thy palette."

Opening the door of the house the two lovers met Porbus coming out.
Astonished at the beauty of the young girl, whose eyes were still wet

with tears, he caught her all trembling by the hand and led her to the
old master.

"There!" he cried; "is she not worth all the masterpieces in the
world?"

Frenhofer quivered. Gillette stood before him in the ingenuous, simple
attitude of a young Georgian, innocent and timid, captured by brigands

and offered to a slave-merchant. A modest blush suffused her cheeks,
her eyes were lowered, her hands hung at her sides, strength seemed to

abandon her, and her tears protested against the violence done to her
purity. Poussin cursed himself, and repented of his folly in bringing

this treasure from their peacefulgarret. Once more he became a lover
rather than an artist; scruples convulsed his heart as he saw the eye

of the old painterregain its youth and, with the artist's habit,
disrobe as it were the beauteous form of the young girl. He was seized

with the jealousfrenzy of a true lover.