Pierston dreaded her presence, but lest, in
conversing with Avice, she should open the girl's eyes to the oddity of
her situation. Avice could see for herself that there must have been two
or three servants in the flat during his former residence there: but his
reasons for doing without them seemed never to strike her.

His intention had been to keep her occupied exclusively at the studio,
but accident had modified this. However, he sent her round one morning,
and entering himself shortly after found her engaged in wiping the
layers of dust from the casts and models.

The colour of the dust never ceased to amaze her. 'It is like the hold
of a Budmouth collier,' she said, 'and the beautiful faces of these clay
people are quite spoilt by it.'

'I suppose you'll marry some day, Avice?' remarked Pierston, as he
regarded her thoughtfully.

'Some do and some don't,' she said, with a reserved smile, still
attending to the casts.'

'You are very offhand,' said he.

She archly weighed that remark without further speech. It was
tantalizing conduct in the face of his instinct to cherish her;
especially when he regarded the charm of her bending profile; the
well-characterized though softly lined nose, the round chin with, as
it were, a second leap in its curve to the throat, and the sweep of the
eyelashes over the rosy cheek during the sedulously lowered glance. How
futilely he had laboured to express the character of that face in clay,
and, while catching it in substance, had yet lost something that was
essential!

That evening after dusk, in the stress of writing letters, he sent
her out for stamps. She had been absent some quarter of an hour when,
suddenly drawing himself up from over his writing-table, it flashed upon
him that he had absolutely forgotten her total ignorance of London.

The head post-office, to which he had sent her because it was late,
was two or three streets off, and he had made his request in the most
general manner, which she had acceded to with alacrity enough. How could
he have done such an unreflecting thing?

Pierston went to the window. It was half-past nine o'clock, and owing to
her absence the blinds were not down. He opened the casement and stepped
out upon the balcony. The green shade of his lamp screened its rays from
the gloom without. Over the opposite square the moon hung, and to the
right there stretched a long street, filled with a diminishing array of
lamps, some single, some in