Well,
most of them don't. We've got that new model to-day."

"What new model?"

"The one Mr. Wetmore was telling us about the old German; he's splendid.
He's got the most beautiful head; just like the old masters' things. He
used to be Humphrey Williams's model for his Biblical-pieces; but since
he's dead, the old man hardly gets anything to do. Mr. Wetmore says
there isn't anybody in the Bible that Williams didn't paint him as. He's
the Law and the Prophets in all his Old Testament pictures, and he's
Joseph, Peter, Judas Iscariot, and the Scribes and Pharisees in the
New."

"It's a good thing people don't know how artists work, or some of the
most sacred pictures would have no influence," said Mrs. Leighton.

"Why, of course not!" cried the girl. "And the influence is the last
thing a painter thinks of--or supposes he thinks of. What he knows
he's anxious about is the drawing and the color. But people will never
understand how simple artists are. When I reflect what a complex and
sophisticated being I am, I'm afraid I can never come to anything in
art. Or I should be if I hadn't genius."

"Do you think Mr. Beaton is very simple?" asked Mrs. Leighton.

"Mr. Wetmore doesn't think he's very much of an artist. He thinks he
talks too well. They believe that if a man can express himself clearly
he can't paint."

"And what do you believe?"

"Oh, I can express myself, too."

The mother seemed to be satisfied with this evasion. After a while she
said, "I presume he will call when he gets settled."

The girl made no answer to this. "One of the girls says that old model
is an educated man. He was in the war, and lost a hand. Doesn't it seem
a pity for such a man to have to sit to a class of affected geese like
us as a model? I declare it makes me sick. And we shall keep him a week,
and pay him six or seven dollars for the use of his grand old head, and
then what will he do? The last time he was regularly employed was when
Mr. Mace was working at his Damascus Massacre. Then he wanted so many
Arab sheiks and Christian elders that he kept old Mr. Lindau steadily
employed for six months. Now he has to pick up odd jobs where he can."

"I suppose he has his pension," said Mrs. Leighton.

"No; one of the girls"--that was the way Alma always described her
fellow-students--"says he has no pension. He didn't apply for it for
a long time, and then there was a hitch about it, and it was
somethinged--vetoed, I believe she said.