Part 12 (1/2)
”I should so like to make a large drawing of this in chalks!” said Alice, still gazing on the miniature.
”You draw so beautifully in chalks! Your style is not often found here--your colouring is so fine.”
”Do you really think so?”
”You must know it, Miss Arden. You are too good an artist not to suspect what everyone else must see, the real excellence of your drawings. Your colouring is better understood in France. Your master, I fancy, was a Frenchman?” said Mr. Longcluse.
”Yes, he was, and we got on very well together. Some of his young lady pupils were very much afraid of him.”
”Your poetry is fired by that picture, Miss Arden. Your copy will be a finer thing than the original,” said he.
”I shall aim only at making it a faithful copy; and if I can accomplish anything like that, I shall be only too glad.”
”I hope you will allow me to see it?” pleaded Longcluse.
”Oh, certainly,” she laughed. ”Only I'm a little afraid of you, Mr.
Longcluse.”
”What can you mean, Miss Arden?”
”I mean, you are so good a critic in art, every one says, that I really _am_ afraid of you,” answered the young lady, laughing.
”I should be very glad to forfeit any little knowledge I have, if it were attended with such a misfortune,” said Longcluse. ”But I don't flatter; I tell you truly, a critic has only to admire, when he looks at your drawings; they are quite above the level of an amateur's work.”
”Well, whether you mean it or not, I _am_ very much flattered,” she laughed. ”And though wise people say that flattery spoils one, I can't help thinking it very agreeable to be flattered.”
At this point of the dialogue Mr. Vivian Darnley--who wished that it should be plain to all, and to one in particular, that he did not care the least what was going on in other parts of the room--began to stumble through the treble of a tune at the piano with his right hand. And whatever other people may have thought of his performance, to Miss Alice Arden it seemed very good music indeed, and inspired her with fresh animation. Such as it was, Mr. Darnley's solo also turned the course of Miss Arden's thoughts from drawing to another art, and she said--
”You, Mr. Longcluse, who know everything about the opera, can you tell me--of course you can--anything about the great ba.s.so who is coming?”
”Stentoroni?”
”Yes; the newspapers and critics promise wonders.”
”It is nearly two years since I heard him. He was very great, and deserves all they say in 'Robert le Diable.' But there his greatness began and ended. The voice, of course, you had, but everything else was defective. It is plain, however, that the man who could make so fine a study of one opera, could with equal labour make as great a success in others. He has not sung in any opera for more than a year and a half, and has been working diligently; and so everyone is in the dark very much, and I am curious to hear the result--and n.o.body knows more than I have told you. You are sure of a good 'Robert le Diable,' but all the rest is speculation.”
”And now, Mr. Longcluse, I shall try your good-nature.”
”How?”
”I am going to make Lady May ask you to sing a song.”
”Pray don't.”
”Why not?”
”I should so much rather you asked me yourself.”
”That's very good of you; then I certainly shall. I _do_ ask you.”
”And I instantly obey. And what shall the song be?” asked he, approaching the piano, to which she also walked.