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They would cross the square and at once discover the masterpiece in stone. They went. They looked at the St. George and at the bronze St. Mark. Dechartre saw again on the wall the post-box, and he recalled with painful exactitude the little gloved hand that had dropped the letter. He thought it hideous, that copper mouth which had swallowed Therese's secret.
The master and the servants are the prey of the publicans." Dechartre and Madame Martin were struck by the unexpected sincerity of his accent. He added: "I like the King. I am sure of my loyalty, but the misfortunes of the peasants move me."
She hurried the rest, said a great deal of Vivian Bell and of Prince Albertinelli, a little of Choulette, and that she had seen Dechartre at Florence. She praised some pictures of the museums, but without discrimination, and only to fill the pages. She knew that Robert had no appreciation of painting; that he admired nothing except a little cuirassier by Detaille, bought at Goupil's.
She looked sympathetically at a statue which had come there from some park, a Flora, lying on the earth, eaten by black moss, her two arms lying by her sides. She thought of raising her soon, of making of her a centrepiece for a fountain. Dechartre, who for an hour had been watching for her coming, joyful, anxious, trembling in his agitated happiness, descended the steps.
She made no reply. When, in her Carmelite mantle, she came to the Lungarno Acciaoli, at about half-past six, Dechartre greeted her with a humble look that moved her. The setting sun made the Arno purple. They remained silent for a moment. While they were walking past the monotonous line of palaces to the old bridge, she was the first to speak. "You see, I have come. I thought I ought to come.
And it is true that Dechartre had wished to be there with Madame Martin. Now all four walked among the Guidos and the Albanos. Miss Bell babbled to the Prince her usual prattle about those old men and those Virgins whose blue mantles were agitated by an immovable tempest.
Dechartre remained sombre and distant during the rest of the dinner: and when, at the moment of leaving, Therese extended her hand to him, she felt that he avoided pressing it in his. The next day, in the hidden pavilion of the Via Alfieri, she found him preoccupied. She tried to distract him with ardent gayety, with the sweetness of pressing intimacy, with superb humility. But he remained sombre.
Miss Bell sent for some shawls, and warned the French women that the evenings were fresh and that the night-air was dangerous. Then suddenly she said: "Darling, you know Monsieur Jacques Dechartre? Well, he wrote to me that he would be at Florence next week. I am glad Monsieur Jacques Dechartre is to meet you in our city.
Dechartre came toward Therese with an air of painful tenderness which moved her. Then, placing his clay and the instrument near the easel, and covering the figure with a wet cloth, he said to the model: "That is enough for to-day." She rose, picked up awkwardly her clothing, a handful of dark wool and soiled linen, and went to dress behind the screen.
I do not affirm that this is the original. But it has always been in the family, and old inventories attribute it to Michael-Angelo. That is all I can say about it." And the Prince turned toward Miss Bell, who was trying to find pictures by the pre-Raphaelites. Dechartre felt uneasy. Since the day before he had thought of Therese. He had all night dreamed and yearned over her image.
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