ays and frank speech,
accustomed as he was to the gay and easy manners of the studios and
green-rooms he frequented. He went into the fashionable world for the
glory of it, but his heart was not in it; he enjoyed it through his
vanity, received congratulations and commissions, and played the gallant
before charming ladies who flattered him, but never paid court to any.
As he did not allow himself to indulge in daring pleasantries and spicy
jests in their society, he thought them all prudes, and himself was
considered as having good taste. Whenever one of them came to pose at
his studio, he felt, in spite of any advances she might make to please
him, that disparity of rank which prevents any real unity between
artists and fashionable people, no matter how much they may be thrown
together. Behind the smiles and the admiration which among women are
always a little artificial, he felt the indefinable mental reserve of
the being that judges itself of superior essence. This brought about in
him an abnormal feeling of pride, which showed itself in a bearing of
haughty respect, dissembling the vanity of the parvenu who is treated
as an equal by princes and princesses, who owes to his talent the
honor accorded to others by their birth. It was said of him with slight
surprise: "He is really very well bred!" This surprise, although it
flattered him, also wounded him, for it indicated a certain social
barrier.

The admirable and ceremonious gravity of the painter a little annoyed
Madame de Guilleroy, who could find nothing to say to this man, so cold,
yet with a reputation for cleverness.

After settling her little daughter, she would come and sit in an
armchair near the newly begun sketch, and tried, according to the
artist's recommendation, to give some expression to her physiognomy.

In the midst of the fourth sitting, he suddenly ceased painting and
inquired:

"What amuses you more than anything else in life?"

She appeared somewhat embarrassed.

"Why, I hardly know. Why this question?"

"I need a happy thought in those eyes, and I have not seen it yet."

"Well, try to make me talk; I like very much to chat."

"Are you gay?"

"Very gay."

"Well, then, let us chat, Madame."

He had said "Let us chat, Madame," in a very grave tone; then, resuming
his painting, he touched upon a variety of subjects, seeking something
on which their minds could meet. They began by exchanging observations
on the people that both knew