he tells me! I'll do what he
tells me!"

Bianca stood silent, looking at the girl, whose heaving breast and
little peacock's feather, whose small round hands twisting in front of
her, and scent about her clothes, all seemed an offence.

"And do you suppose that he'll tell you what he wants? Do you imagine
he'll have the necessary brutality to get rid of you? He'll think
himself bound to keep you till you leave him, as I suppose you will some
day!"

The girl dropped her hands. "I'll never leave him--never!" she cried out
passionately.

"Then Heaven help him!" said Bianca.

The little model's eyes seemed to lose all pupil, like two chicory
flowers that have no dark centres. Through them, all that she was
feeling struggled to find an outlet; but, too deep for words, those
feelings would not pass her lips, utterly unused to express emotion. She
could only stammer:

"I'm not--I'm not--I will---" and press her hands again to her breast.

Bianca's lip curled.

"I see; you imagine yourself capable of sacrifice. Well, you have your
chance. Take it!" She pointed to the corded trunk. "Now's your time; you
have only to disappear!"

The little model shrank back against the windowsill. "He wants me!" she
muttered. "I know he wants me."

Bianca bit her lips till the blood came.

"Your idea of sacrifice," she said, "is perfect! If you went now, in a
month's time he'd never think of you again."

The girl gulped. There was something so pitiful in the movements of her
hands that Bianca turned away. She stood for several seconds staring at
the door, then, turning round again, said:

"Well?"

But the girl's whole face had changed. All tear-stained, indeed, she had
already masked it with a sort of immovable stolidity.

Bianca went swiftly up to the trunk.

"You shall!" she said. "Take that thing and go."

The little model did not move.

"So you won't?"

The girl trembled violently all over. She moistened her lips, tried
to speak, failed, again moistened them, and this time murmured; "I'll
only--I'll only--if he tells me!"

"So you still imagine he will tell you!"

The little model merely repeated: "I won't--won't do anything without he
tells me!"

Bianca laughed. "Why, it's like a dog!" she said.

But the girl had turned abruptly to the window. Her lips were parted.
She was shrinking, fluttering, trembling at what she saw. She was indeed
like a spaniel dog who sees her master coming. Bianca had no need of
be