on in London, which, he assured himself dogmatically,
was the only place on earth where he could face life with an
indifference which was at least a tolerable imitation of equanimity.

To get together the materials for even a modest exhibition of the
kind which he contemplated, it became necessary for him to ransack
old portfolios, and to borrow from dealers, and from his few
discriminating private patrons, works which had but recently left
his studio and could still be traced; to utilize all the hours of
daylight accorded to him by a grudging season for finishing,
mounting, and retouching.

The man who made frames for Oswyn knew him of old as an exacting
customer and hard to please, who insisted on a rigid adherence to
his own designs, and was quick to detect inferior workmanship or
material; but during the last few days he had been driven almost to
rebellion by the painter's exigencies; never had such calls been
made upon him for flawless glass, and delicately varied shades of
gold and silver; never had artist's eye been so ruthless in the
condemnation of imperfect mitres and superfluous plaster.

But now the work of preparation was at an end: the catalogues had
been printed, and his _impresario_ had judiciously circulated
invitations to press and public: the work was done, and the workman
felt only weary and indifferent. If the public howled, what did it
matter? Their hostility would be for him a corroboration, for his
Jew an invaluable advertisement. If they fawned, so much the better:
it would not hurt him, and Mosenthal would still have his
advertisement. If they were indifferent, well, so was he.

The question of pecuniary profit troubled him not at all (though
here his Jew joined issue): what in the world could he do with
money, now? He could paint a picture in a month which would keep him
for six, and the dealer who bought it probably for a year.

Margot was already provided for, even handsomely: in that respect,
at least, her first adopted father had left no void for his
successor to fill.

So again he shrugged his shoulders. And upon that evening, for the
first time since Rainham's death, he dined, more solitary and more
silent than ever, at his familiar table at Brodonowski's. He found
that, after all, his nervous anticipation of inconvenient
protestations of sympathy was not fulfilled; there were not many men
who knew him more than by sight at Brodonowski's, and the few of his
old associates who wer