eatures were in harmony with this idea. The beautiful
mouth was hard and cruel. The lips and cheeks were bright as if
artificially tinted, or flushed with wine. The eyes were bold and the
pupils seemed expanded as with belladonna. The nostrils of the finely
shaped nose were full and sensual. Her luxuriant brown hair, singularly
like that of the portrait above her in color, she wore in the late
French mode, combed back from her high, broad forehead and twisted into
a massive device at the top. Her eyebrows were unnaturally dark. An
artificial air pervaded the entire picture--one felt that she had an
artificial soul. A perfect prototype of Folly's feverish and heartless
world.

As the artist stood gazing from one to the other, the curious vexed and
puzzled expression that had come into his face once before that day
returned. He approached closely to the work as if to examine it more
minutely. As he bent low over the face on the easel he heard the street
door open. He started guiltily, and hastily turned both pictures to the
wall. A moment later a tall, fair-haired man of about his own age
entered without knocking. It was Harry Lawton, the artist's most
intimate friend.

"Julian, old boy, how goes it?" he said, cheerily.

"Pretty well, Harry; come in."

"Yes, I should do that any way. I don't seem to be any too welcome,
however."

"Nonsense, Harry, of course you are welcome; I am very glad, in fact, to
see you, just now.

"Well, that's better; although I must say your face doesn't indicate
excessive joy."

"Sit down; not there--here by the door; I want to show you something."

"Oh, some new and wonderful work of your transcendent genius, I suppose.
By the way, how is the picture for the Salon getting along?"

"Tediously, Harry; I seem to have lost the spirit of the thing."

"Found too much spirit of another kind, perhaps."

"No, not that. I have been a model of abstinence of late."

"And the heavens do not fall?

"No--yes--that is--let your tongue rest for a moment, please, and use
your eyes."

While the artist had been speaking he had taken the large screen from
before the window and moved his easel into a stronger light. Upon it he
now placed the two portraits in their former position. The effect upon
the other was vigorous and immediate.

"Heavens! Julian, where did you get that angel and that dev--I beg
pardon, that extraordinary pair of beauties? Oh, I see!--why, of course!
a new idea for the Salon