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very outset. He would fulfil his promise honourably, whatever the spiritual cost of it! But he could not face money humiliations in the eyes of his inferiors! A thousand times "no"! He must trust, despite all, to his own strength and performance!--he would do brilliantly with his pictures in the spring!--he would follow up the success and conquer London! He waved aside all his past disasters: he saw his good star in the ascendant, shining--he fixed his eyes on it fanatically. It was an irony of ironies that, after his great surrender, his pride should still flame up unconquered. Before the moral tragedy of love yoked to mockery, he might bow his head in resignation; but Miss Robinson's fortune loomed up as a ridiculous and contemptible complication in a situation already nigh impossible. The metaphor of the vulture was often back in his mind now! The heap of carrion!--he had stooped for the sake of it, and it was now even more loathsome than his former morbid perception of it. His poverty seemed suddenly unbearable. In the past he had endured it. Now, for the first time, he was ashamed of it. So he spoke to the Robinsons of a six months' engagement or thereabouts--which, to their ideas, was reputable and in order; and then felt he had time before him to fling down the gauntlet to fortune again. But in estimating his resources he had counted without his new allies. Alice whispered into her father's ears her conviction that he might easily influence commissions for her _fiance_; and, after thinking about it, Mr. Robinson felt he would like to have a try. A rich, powerful Insurance Corporation had voted a portrait of its retiring president for the adornment of its board-room. Mr. Robinson set to work astutely, and the commission came to Wyndham. Item, three hundred guineas. But, before this new portrait had progressed very far, Wyndham had fascinated his subject--a tall, white-bearded merchant prince who sat to him with mysterious insignia, and resplendent chains and emblems. "A marvellous young fellow," he confided to Mr. Robinson. "I must really congratulate you on him--it's a treat to be in his society. And gifted! That great picture of Hyde Park Corner is worthy of Raphael." And for the pleasure of his company, and out of admiration for his talent, this bluff, good-natured president had at once arranged for paintings of himself and his wife for his own dining-room. He generously and spontaneously made the f
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