n if Lady Treffinger didn't prosecute you'd be done
for."

"Blow my character!--your pardon, sir," cried James, starting to his
feet. "W'at do I want of a character? I'll chuck the 'ole thing, and
damned lively, too. The shop's to be sold out, an' my place is gone
any'ow. I'm agoing to enlist, or try the gold fields. I've lived too
long with h'artists; I'd never give satisfaction in livery now. You know
'ow it is yourself, sir; there ayn't no life like it, no'ow."

For a moment MacMaster was almost equal to abetting James in his theft.
He reflected that pictures had been whitewashed, or hidden in the crypts
of churches, or under the floors of palaces from meaner motives, and to
save them from a fate less ignominious. But presently, with a sigh, he
shook his head.

"No, James, it won't do at all. It has been tried over and over again,
ever since the world has been agoing and pictures amaking. It was tried
in Florence and in Venice, but the pictures were always carried away in
the end. You see, the difficulty is that although Treffinger told you
what was not to be done with the picture, he did not say definitely what
was to be done with it. Do you think Lady Treffinger really understands
that he did not want it to be sold?"

"Well, sir, it was like this, sir," said James, resuming his seat on the
trunk and again resting the picture against his knee. "My memory is as
clear as glass about it. After Sir 'Ugh got up from 'is first stroke, 'e
took a fresh start at the _Marriage_. Before that 'e 'ad been working
at it only at night for a while back; the _Legend_ was the big picture
then, an' was under the north light w'ere 'e worked of a morning. But
one day 'e bid me take the _Legend_ down an' put the _Marriage_ in its
place, an' 'e says, dashin' on 'is jacket, 'Jymes, this is a start for
the finish, this time.'

"From that on 'e worked at the night picture in the mornin'--a thing
contrary to 'is custom. The _Marriage_ went wrong, and wrong--an' Sir
'Ugh agettin' seedier an' seedier every day. 'E tried models an' models,
an' smudged an' pynted out on account of 'er face goin' wrong in the
shadow. Sometimes 'e layed it on the colors, an' swore at me an' things
in general. He got that discouraged about 'imself that on 'is low days
'e used to say to me: 'Jymes, remember one thing; if anythink 'appens to
me, the _Marriage_ is not to go out of 'ere unfinished. It's worth the
lot of 'em, my boy, an' it's not agoing to go shabby