l, for I am firmly convinced
that the very mention of evil begets evil. Such is man; moulded perhaps
after the Divine image in some respects, he has in his composition quite
as much of his brother beasts as of divinity. Curious lord of creation!
As if there were not enough misery in the world as it is, he must needs
go out of his way to torture kittens.

In this crisis of her life Frida found two friends, absolutely devoted
and sympathetic: Helene and her husband. They, more than anybody, helped
her through those first sad weeks. How mistaken the girls had been when
they thought Helene worldly and heartless. My little flirt was then, and
has proved herself through life, the most steadfast and reliable of us
all. Her two brothers, the chubby boys, were now students at the Leipsic
University, qualifying themselves for future town-councillorships and
civic honours, coupled, I presume, with some German substitute for
turtle soup.

Frida spent much of her time in the congenial atmosphere of my parents'
house. We had always been devoted to her; how much more now! She loved
music, and that, with us, was a sort of staple commodity to be found as
surely as the daily bread. It was not an easy task to divert her
thoughts from her trouble. All her girlish brightness had vanished, and
she seemed, without a warning, to have had womanhood, suffering
womanhood, thrust upon her. But she loved to be soothed by music, and
more than once I remember my father improvising strains of consolation
on his grand Erard, that seemed to go straight to her heart and
strengthen her.

"Will you sit for me, Frida?" I asked one evening. "I should like to
draw a portrait of you."

I had known Frida for four or five years, and had never asked her to
sit, so the question surprised her, and it startled my mother, who was
seated at the other end of the drawing-room on a little raised platform,
surrounded by palms and a variety of plants with curiously shaped and
fancifully speckled leaves. Her spinning-wheel, that had been going
round with the regularity of clockwork, suddenly stopped--perhaps the
thread had snapped. Catching my eye she reproachfully signalled behind
Frida's back: "How can you, my dear? Surely this is not the time to use
the poor girl as a model?" Frida evidently thought so too; she was at a
loss for an answer, and there was an awkward silence. For an instant I
wished I had not spoken; my request, I felt, was really ill timed; but,
once