, chere Madame; she cannot come to the dinner--a thousand
pardons."

"I am sorry the Countess is ill."

Potowski, who had been told by his hostess not to dress, had made up for
the sacrifice as brilliantly as he could. His waistcoat was of
embroidered satin, his cravat a flaming scarlet, and in his button-hole
an exotic flower which went well with his dark, exotic face. He was a
little ridiculous: short and fat, with a fashion of gesticulating with
his hands as though he were swimming into society, but his expression
was agreeable and candid. His near-sighted eyes were naive, his voice
sweet and caressing. Rainsford saw that his hostess liked Potowski. She
was too sweet a lady to be annoyed by peculiarities.

In a few moments, the lame sculptor on one side and the flashy Slav on
the other, she led them to the little dining-room, to an exquisite
table, served by two men in livery.

There was an intimacy in the apartment shut in by the panelling from
floor to ceiling of the walls. The windows were covered with yellow
damask curtains and the footfalls made no sound on the thick carpet.

"Mr. Rainsford is a sculptor," his hostess told Potowski. "He has
studied with Cedersholm, but we shall soon forget whose pupil he is when
he is a master himself."

"Ah," murmured the young man, who was nevertheless thrilled.

"He is going to do a bas-relief of me, Potowski--that is, I hope he will
not refuse to make my portrait."

"Ah, no," exclaimed Potowski, clasping his soft hands, "not a
bas-relief, chere Madame, but a statuary, all of it. The figure, is not
it, Mr. Rainsford? You hear people say of the face it is beautiful, or
the hand, or the head of a woman. I think it is all of her. It should
be the entirety always, I think. I think it is monstrous to dissect the
parts of the human body even in art. When I go to the _Museo_ and see a
hand here, a foot there, a torso somewhere else--you will laugh, I am
ridiculous, but it makes me think I look at a _haccident_.

"_Therefore_," exclaimed Potowski, gaily swimming toward the fruit and
flowers with his soft hand, "begin, cher Monsieur, by making a whole
woman! I never, never sing part of a _hopera_. I sing a lyric, a little
complete song, but in its entirety."

"But, my dear Potowski," Mrs. Faversham laughed, "a bas-relief or a bust
is complete."

"But why," cried the Pole, "why behead a lady? As for a profile, it is
destruction to the human face." He turned to Fairfax. "Yo