nd and be sure of obedience. In the eyes of a tiger
there is a terrific mentality. Miss Van Tuyn thought of that as she
gazed at the portrait.

In her silence now she was trying to get a strong hold on herself. The
first shock of astonishment, and almost of horror, had passed. She was
more sharply conscious now of Garstin in connexion with herself. At last
she spoke again.

"Of course you realize, Dick, that such a portrait as that is an
outrage. It's a master work, I believe, but it is an outrage. You cannot
exhibit it."

"But I shall. This man, Arabian, isn't known."

"How can we tell that?"

"Do you know a living creature he knows or who knows him?"

"Everyone has acquaintances. Everyone almost has friends. He must
certainly have both."

"God knows who or where they are."

"You cannot exhibit it," she repeated obstinately.

"I hate art in kid gloves. But this is too merciless. It is more. It is
a libel."

"That's just where you're wrong."

"No."

"Beryl, my girl, you are lying. That's no use with me."

"I am not lying!" she said with hot anger.

Suddenly she felt that tears had come into her eyes.

"How hateful you are!" she exclaimed.

She felt frightened under the eyes of the portrait. Garstin's revelation
had struck upon her like a blow. She felt dazed by it. Yet she longed
to hit back. She wanted to defend Arabian, perhaps because she felt that
she needed defence.

Garstin came abruptly round the sofa and sat down by her side.

"What's up?" he said in a kinder voice.

"Why do you paint like that? It's abominable!"

"Tell me the honest truth--God's own truth, as they call it, I don't
know why--is that picture fine, is it my best work, or isn't it?"

"I've told you already. It's a technical masterpiece and a moral
outrage. You have taken a man for a model and painted a beast."

"Beryl," he said almost solemnly, "believe it or not, as you can, that
_is_ Arabian!"

He pointed at the picture as he spoke. His keen eyes, half shut, were
fixed upon it.

"That _is_ the real man, and what you see is only the appearance he
chooses to give of himself."

"How do you know? How can you know that?"

"Haven't I the power to show men and women as in essence they are?"

His eyes travelled round the big studio slowly, travelled from canvas to
canvas, from the battered old siren of the streets to the girl who was
dreaming of sins not yet committed; from Cora waiting for her prey to
the judge who h