It is a seashore, you remember, and the little
ripples play about her ankles. The first blush of the dawn robes
her white body in a transparent mantle of light. Ah! God's
mercy! it was as she stood so, in a little cove of Normandy,
that I saw her!"
He paused, rolling his dark eyes; and I could hear Andrews's
heavy breathing; then:
"It was the 'new art'--the posing of the model not in a lighted
studio, but in the scene to be depicted.
"And the fellow who painted her!--the man with the barbarous name!
Bah! he was big--as big as our Mr. Andrews--and ugly--pooh!
uglier than he! A moon-face, with cropped skull like a prize-
fighter and no soul. But, yes, he could paint. 'A Dream at
Dawn' was genius--yes, some soul he must have had.
"He could paint, dear friends, but he could not love. Him I
counted as--puff!"
He blew imaginary down into space.
"Her I sought out, and presently found. She told me, in those
sweet stolen rambles along the shore, when the moonlight made her
look like a Madonna, that she was his inspiration--his art--his
life. And she wept; she wept, and I kissed her tears away.
"To please her I waited until 'A Dream at Dawn' was finished.
With the finish of the picture, finished also his dream of dawn--
the moon-faced one's.
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