length of Italy, Rome, Naples, and Florence. "Ah! Florence, Florence!"
Narcisse repeated languorously. He had lighted a cigarette and his words
fell more slowly, as he glanced round the room. "You were very well
lodged here," he said, "it is very quiet. I had never come up to this
floor before."

His eyes continued wandering over the walls until they were at last
arrested by the old painting which the lamp illumined, and thereupon he
remained for a moment blinking as if surprised. And all at once he rose
and approached the picture. "Dear me, dear me," said he, "but that's very
good, that's very fine."

"Isn't it?" rejoined Pierre. "I know nothing about painting but I was
stirred by that picture on the very day of my arrival, and over and over
again it has kept me here with my heart beating and full of indescribable
feelings."

Narcisse no longer spoke but examined the painting with the care of a
connoisseur, an expert, whose keen glance decides the question of
authenticity, and appraises commercial value. And the most extraordinary
delight appeared upon the young man's fair, rapturous face, whilst his
fingers began to quiver. "But it's a Botticelli, it's a Botticelli! There
can be no doubt about it," he exclaimed. "Just look at the hands, and
look at the folds of the drapery! And the colour of the hair, and the
technique, the flow of the whole composition. A Botticelli, ah! _mon
Dieu_, a Botticelli."

He became quite faint, overflowing with increasing admiration as he
penetrated more and more deeply into the subject, at once so simple and
so poignant. Was it not acutely modern? The artist had foreseen our
pain-fraught century, our anxiety in presence of the invisible, our
distress at being unable to cross the portal of mystery which was for
ever closed. And what an eternal symbol of the world's wretchedness was
that woman, whose face one could not see, and who sobbed so distractedly
without it being possible for one to wipe away her tears. Yes, a
Botticelli, unknown, uncatalogued, what a discovery! Then he paused to
inquire of Pierre: "Did you know it was a Botticelli?"

"Oh no! I spoke to Don Vigilio about it one day, but he seemed to think
it of no account. And Victorine, when I spoke to her, replied that all
those old things only served to harbour dust."

Narcisse protested, quite stupefied: "What! they have a Botticelli here
and don't know it! Ah! how well I recognise in that the Roman princes
who, unless th