on her that searching, steady gaze which seems to reach the soul. Whether it reached hers, whether any memory came back to her as she met those cold stern eyes, I cannot tell. She did not speak, only stood there as it mesmerised into silence or fear.
"'You will do,' said Christian, suddenly. 'Your face is all I want; the history of sin, and wasted years, and suffering, and retribution. Come here to-morrow at two o'clock. Your terms?'
"'That is for monsieur to decide,' she said low and faintly.
"He named a sum that to me seemed extravagant, but I said nothing. As for the woman, she dropped her veil, and, with a murmured, 'Adieu, messieurs,' glided from the room.
"You will do."
"I wondered what fleeting memory, what ghost of the past that brief glance had recalled, but the reality evaded me again and again. She came the next day, and for many days after, and every time I saw her the same vague uneasiness, the same fleeting memory troubled my mind. My friend alone said nothing, but worked steadily, doggedly on, and she was singularly reticent for one of her sex and profession. I thought she seemed afraid of Christian, and I wondered that he, who was usually so courteous and gentle to women, should be always so brusque and stern to her. Well, the picture grew and approached completion, and the memory that had so long haunted me took at last a deeper shadow of certainty. I did not speak of it, I dared not; but it seemed to me impossible that Christian should not know whom he was using as a model. Was there—I asked myself—some purpose beneath that pretence of ignorance, some surer vengeance to be achieved by this utter ignoring of a woman whose life now was reaping the fruits of its own ill deeds in the past. The day of the last sitting came. When he at last made the signal of dismissal, she came over and looked timidly at the easel.
"'May I see it?' she asked; 'the picture, I mean.'
"'Certainly,' he said coldly, and stepped aside so that she might face the picture as it stood there in the full light. I watched her, wondering and fascinated. She looked at it a long, long time; her face was very pale, her great eyes had a sombre, vengeful look.
"'What do you call it?' she said at last.
"He smiled, as he wiped his brushes in a cool, indifferent fashion. Had he no thought, no regret, no fear for that living, passionate piece of womanhood, whose very soul and secrets he seemed to have laid bare
