true it all depends upon that,"
Felix added.

"You know there is a great deal of misery in the world," said his model.

"I have seen a little of it," the young man rejoined. "But it was all
over there--beyond the sea. I don't see any here. This is a paradise."

Gertrude said nothing; she sat looking at the dahlias and the
currant-bushes in the garden, while Felix went on with his work. "To
'enjoy,'" she began at last, "to take life--not painfully, must one do
something wrong?"

Felix gave his long, light laugh again. "Seriously, I think not. And for
this reason, among others: you strike me as very capable of enjoying,
if the chance were given you, and yet at the same time as incapable of
wrong-doing."

"I am sure," said Gertrude, "that you are very wrong in telling a person
that she is incapable of that. We are never nearer to evil than when we
believe that."

"You are handsomer than ever," observed Felix, irrelevantly.

Gertrude had got used to hearing him say this. There was not so much
excitement in it as at first. "What ought one to do?" she continued. "To
give parties, to go to the theatre, to read novels, to keep late hours?"

"I don't think it 's what one does or one does n't do that promotes
enjoyment," her companion answered. "It is the general way of looking at
life."

"They look at it as a discipline--that 's what they do here. I have
often been told that."

"Well, that 's very good. But there is another way," added Felix,
smiling: "to look at it as an opportunity."

"An opportunity--yes," said Gertrude. "One would get more pleasure that
way."

"I don't attempt to say anything better for it than that it has been my
own way--and that is not saying much!" Felix had laid down his palette
and brushes; he was leaning back, with his arms folded, to judge
the effect of his work. "And you know," he said, "I am a very petty
personage."

"You have a great deal of talent," said Gertrude.

"No--no," the young man rejoined, in a tone of cheerful impartiality,
"I have not a great deal of talent. It is nothing at all remarkable.
I assure you I should know if it were. I shall always be obscure. The
world will never hear of me." Gertrude looked at him with a strange
feeling. She was thinking of the great world which he knew and which she
did not, and how full of brilliant talents it must be, since it could
afford to make light of his abilities. "You need n't in general attach
much importance to anything I