y lived had been razed to the ground. It was
over there on the other side of the Marne. And now it was ever so long
since she had received any word from Paul, and they had saved very
little, because money came so easily, and--and now Paul was dead and she
couldn't sing!

Frieda was in the room with me when the tale was told. She rushed out,
and I found her, a few minutes later, in my room, her nose swollen and
her eyes devastated by weeping. But she used my wash-basin and towels
for plentiful ablutions and returned to the room where I left her alone
with Frances Dupont, realizing the futility of a man in such
circumstances.

At the end of another week our stout angel burst again into my room.
Eulalie had been discharged, with mutual regrets, and little Paul was
growing apace. Three and a half ounces in seven days!

"Dave! We've got to find something for Frances to do! In a very short
time she will not have a penny left. Go to work at once and, in the
meanwhile, I'll do my best also. Yes, I know perfectly well that the two
of us will see that she doesn't suffer, but she doesn't want charity;
she wants work!"

She was off again, and I knew that she would at once inquire of the
butcher, the baker and the candlestick-maker in regard to positions
suited to a young woman with a Murillo-face and a baby. I put on my hat
and went at once to Gordon's studio, facing Central Park. I was lucky
enough to find him in.

"Sit down and don't bother me," he said pleasantly. "I must use up the
last of this light."

Before him stood an easel with a wonderful portrait of a young woman
endowed with splendid neck and arms. He was working at some detail of
the gown, which the lady had evidently sent over for him, since the
garment was disposed about a large mannikin with a vacuous face. I
watched delightedly the sure touches with which he reproduced the sheen
of the silk. Gordon doesn't want to talk while he paints, pretending
that in order to do his best work a man must bend all his energies to
it, whether he is sawing wood or writing elegies.

"People wouldn't begin chatting to a fellow while he played Chopin," he
told me one day. "What right have they to disturb the harmonies in a
man's mind when he's creating melodies in color? Hang their
impertinence!"

I presume, however, that painting a silk dress was somewhat mechanical
work to him, for, after some minutes of silent toil, during which he
only stepped back once to survey his w