r as best she could with a jocose appellative
like "signor," "monsieur," or "Mr. John Kendal," in full.
"Jack" was impossible, "John" was worse. Yes, with a
little nervous shudder, _much_ worse.

He told her about Paris to her fascination; she had never
seen it: about the boulevards and the cafes and the men's
ateliers, and the vagrant pathos of student life there--he
had seen some clean bits of it--and to all of this old
story he gave such life as a word or a phrase can give.
Even his repressions were full of meaning, and the
best--she felt it was the best--he had to offer her he
offered in fewest words, letting her imagination riot
with them. He described Lucien and the American Colony.
He made her laugh abundantly over the American amateur
as Lucien managed him. They had no end of fun over these
interesting, ingenious, and prodigal people in their
relation to Parisian professional circles. He touched on
Nadie Palicsky lightly, and perhaps it was because Janet
insisted upon an accentuation of the lines--he had sent
her a photograph of one of Nadie's best things--that he
refrained from mentioning Elfrida altogether. Elfrida,
he thought, he would keep till another time. She would
need so much explanation; she was too interesting to lug
in now, it was getting late. Besides, Elfrida was an
exhausting subject, and he was rather done.

CHAPTER XI.

Individually a large number of Royal Academicians
pronounced John Kendal's work impertinent, if not
insulting, meaningless, affected, or flippant.
Collectively, with a corporate opinion that might be
discussed but could not be identified, they received it
and hung it, smothering a distressful doubt, where it
would be least likely to excite either the censure of
the right-minded or the admiration of the unorthodox.
The Grosvenor gave him a discreet appreciation, and the
New received him with joy and thanksgiving. If he had
gone to any of the Private Views, which temptation he
firmly resisted, he would have heard the British public
--for after all the British public is always well
represented at a Private View--say discontentedly how
much better it would like his pictures if they were only
a little more finished. He might even have had the cruel
luck to hear one patron of the arts, who began by designing
the pictorial advertisements for his own furniture-polish,
state that he would buy that twilight effect with the
empty fields, if only the trees in the foreground