lived. As Eveline pushed open the kitchen-door very
gently she noticed that the door of the inner room opened suddenly and
a woman looked out. This was undoubtedly Arpad's mother, who was
curious to see who had come to visit her son.

Eveline went on her toes to the door of the opposite apartment, and
noiselessly turned the handle; she wanted to surprise Arpad.

His room was the picture of comfort and order. It was easy to see how
carefully it was kept by his mother. The table, the walls, were
crowded with handsome pictures and ornaments, the gift of different
persons--cups, wood-carvings, antique weapons, classical paintings;
the windows were supplied with plants in bloom; there were bookcases
full of books. Everything was well arranged; there was taste and
comfort, and Arpad liked to be at home better than anywhere else. The
hired piano was from Erard's manufactory, and was now open. Arpad was
sitting with his back to it, brush in hand; he was painting. The
pianoforte-player was also a painter. Artists, many of them, indulge
in these freaks. One of our most distinguished portrait-painters loves
to torture his neighbors by scratching like a cat upon the strings of
a violin; so also a well-known musician spends his time writing feeble
verses; and a third, who is a real poet, produces unsightly
excrescences in marble and terra-cotta.

What was Arpad painting?

Eveline stepped softly behind his back, but the rustle of her silk
dress betrayed her presence.

Arpad turned scarlet, shoved the picture into a drawer, and, getting
up quickly, confronted his visitor, who had only time to see that it
was a portrait he was painting.

"Ah, it is you," he stammered, in an embarrassed voice. "I thought it
was my mother."

"Aha, you are doing something you should not! Your mother does not
allow you to paint; isn't that it? Well, it is a silly thing, I must
say, for a pianoforte-player to spend his time painting; and what is
the subject?"

"Oh, nothing--a flower!"

("What a lie!" thought Eveline; "it was a portrait.")

"Then if it is a flower, give it to me."

"I should rather not."

"But if it is only a flower?"

"I am not going to give it to you."

"Don't be so cross. Won't you ask me to sit down?"

Arpad was really vexed. Why had she come to disturb him just at this
moment? Any other time she would have been welcome. This beginning
spoiled the happy hour; for the picture was not Eveline's portrait.

"Sit near m