though
he had been refused a score of times. Ayala was to the sculptor only
second in sacredness to Lucy. And now he was told by Tom himself that
he was--"going in for Ayala." The expression was so distressing to
his feelings that he shuddered when he heard it. Was it possible that
any one should say of him that he was "going in" for Lucy? At that
moment Sir Thomas opened the door, and grasping Hamel by the hand led
him away into his own sanctum.

"And now, Mr. Hamel," said Sir Thomas, in his cheeriest voice, "how
are you?" Hamel declared that he was very well, and expressed a hope
that Sir Thomas was the same. "I am not so young as I was, Mr. Hamel.
My years are heavier and so is my work. That's the worst of it. When
one is young and strong one very often hasn't enough to do. I daresay
you find it so sometimes."

"In our profession," said Hamel, "we go on working, though very often
we do not sell what we do."

"That's bad," said Sir Thomas.

"It is the case always with an artist before he has made a name for
himself. It is the case with many up to the last day of a life of
labour. An artist has to look for that, Sir Thomas."

"Dear me! That seems very sad. You are a sculptor, I believe?"

"Yes, Sir Thomas."

"And the things you make must take a deal of room and be very heavy."
At this Mr. Hamel only smiled. "Don't you think if you were to call
an auction you'd get something for them?" At this suggestion the
sculptor frowned but condescended to make no reply. Sir Thomas went
on with his suggestion. "If you and half-a-dozen other beginners made
a sort of gallery among you, people would buy them as they do those
things in the Marylebone Road and stick them up somewhere about their
grounds. It would be better than keeping them and getting nothing."
Hamel had in his studio at home an allegorical figure of Italia
United, and another of a Prostrate Roman Catholic Church, which
in his mind's eye he saw for a moment stuck here or there about
the gardens of some such place as Glenbogie! Into them had been
infused all the poetry of his nature and all the conviction of his
intelligence. He had never dreamed of selling them. He had never
dared to think that any lover of Art would encourage him to put into
marble those conceptions of his genius which now adorned his studio,
standing there in plaster of Paris. But to him they were so valuable,
they contained so much of his thoughts, so many of his aspirations,
that even ha