ver occurred to me to ask her age. I suppose
it's a sort of grown-up age, but then, to be sure, she is quite a child,
poor little thing."

And so on, and so on. Every morning he brought a fresh red rose for the
pale girl. _Sub rosa_, to be sure, was the sketch-book. Now that he had
found his long-sought model, he was glowing with the desire to make
studies from her, and so he spent the better part of a week by her
bedside, pencil in hand. The drawings I thought by far the best things I
had ever seen of his; especially one in which he had used a few coloured
chalks, and where the amethyst eyes gazed at you wonderingly. I have
since sometimes been reminded of those eyes in the work of Gabriel Max.

* * * * *

We had met in Orleans as I have said, and started on our walking tour in
a southerly direction along the banks of the Loire. We were most
unconventionally equipped, wearing caps and blouses, and carrying only
the artist's knapsacks with a change of clothes and sketch-books.

What can be more glorious than walking, if you have the right boots to
tread along in, and the right friend by your side? It was perfect. The
river flowed with a will, the birds sang with a soul, and we could not
but catch the note and go forward in unison with stream and song. We
were in such high spirits that we found it hard to pass a man without
hurling a cordial _bon jour_ or a thundering bad joke at him. We helped
old women with their bundles, and pauperised small children by giving
them sous when they never dreamt of asking for such a thing.

Thus we pushed on, till we reached a town, not the first day, but
another. What town I have forgotten; nor do I remember what art
treasures may have been accumulated within its walls. I only know that
our sketch-books were out, and that we had found a corner of the
market-place, from which we could, without being too much noticed, catch
the characteristic figures that were buying and selling, sitting,
standing, or hanging about.

We had been working some time, when a friendly native of the fair sex,
who had evidently taken a discreet interest in our work, requested us,
with profuse apologies for the interruption, to give her a few minutes'
interview at her shop, as soon as we should have finished.

"It is just over the way," she said; "'Leroux, Smith and Carriage
Varnisher,' is written over the door."

In due time we went, and Madame Leroux asked us with some tre