Part 2 (1/2)

”_Nom de Dieu de nom de Dieu!_” cried he. ”It is Gian Bellini's Doge Loredano. But what made you remember that picture, and how in the name of Board schools could you manage to draw it?”

He walked swiftly up and down the room.

”_Nom de Dieu de nom de Dieu!_”

”I used to draw horses and men on my slate at school,” said I modestly.

Paragot filled his porcelain pipe and walked about strangely excited.

Suddenly he stopped.

”My little Asticot,” said he, ”you had better go down and help Mrs.

Housekeeper to wash up the dirty plates and dishes, for your soul's sake.”

What my soul had to do with greasy crockery I could not in the least fathom; but the next morning Paragot gave me a drawing lesson. It would be false modesty for me to say that I did not show talent, since the making of pictures is the means whereby I earn my living at the present moment. The gift once discovered, I exercised it in and out of season.

”My son,” said Paragot, when I showed him a sketch of Mrs. Housekeeper as she lay on the scullery floor one Sat.u.r.day night, unable to go any one of her several ways, ”I am afraid you are an artist. Do you know what an artist is?”

I didn't. He p.r.o.nounced the word in tones of such deep melancholy that I felt it must denote something particularly depraved.

”It is the man who has the power of doing up his soul in whitey-brown paper parcels and selling them at three halfpence apiece.”

This was at breakfast one morning while he was chipping an egg. Only two eggs furnished forth our repast, and I was already deep in mine. He scooped off the top of the sh.e.l.l, regarded it for a second and then rose with the egg and went to the window.

”Since you have wings you had better fly,” said he, and he threw it into the street.

”My little Asticot,” he added, resuming his seat. ”I myself was once an artist: now I am a philosopher: it is much better.”

He cheerfully attacked his bread and b.u.t.ter. Whether it was a sense of his goodness or my own greediness that prompted me I know not, but I pushed my half eaten egg across to him and begged him to finish it. He looked queerly at me for a moment.

”I accept it,” said he, ”in the spirit in which it is offered.”

The great man solemnly ate my egg, and pride so filled my heart that I could scarcely swallow. A smaller man than Paragot would have refused.

From what I gathered from conversations overheard whilst I was serving members with tripe and alcohol, it appeared that my revered master was a mysterious personage. About eight months before, he had entered the then unprosperous Club for the first time as a guest of the founder and proprietor, an old actor who was growing infirm. He talked vehemently.

The next night he took the presidential chair which he since occupied, to the Club's greater glory. But whence he came, who and what he was, no one seemed to know. One fat man whose air of portentous wisdom (and insatiable appet.i.te) caused me much annoyance, proclaimed him a Russian Nihilist and asked me whether there were any bombs in his bedroom.

Another man declared that he had seen him leading a bear in the streets of Warsaw. His manner offended me.

”Have you ever been to Warsaw, Mr. Ulysses?” asked the fat man. Mr.

Ulysses was the traditional t.i.tle of the head of the Lotus Club.

”This gentleman says he saw you leading a bear there, Master,” I piped, wrathfully, in my shrill treble.

There was the sudden silence of consternation. All, some five and twenty, laid down their knives and forks and looked at Paragot, who rose from his seat. Throwing out his right hand he declaimed:

[Greek: ”Andra moi ennepe, Mousa, polutropon, os mala polla plagchthe, epei Troies Ieron ptoliethron epersen pollon d' anthropon iden astea, kai noon egno.]

”Does anyone know what that is?”