Part 52 (1/2)
”Oh the time flies!” sighed Nick with a spontaneity that made his companion again laugh out--a demonstration in which for a moment he himself rather ruefully joined.
”Does she like you to paint?” that personage asked with one of his candid intonations.
”So she says.”
”Well, do something fine to show her.”
”I'd rather show it to you,” Nick confessed.
”My dear fellow, I see it from here--if you do your duty. Do you remember the Tragic Muse?” Nash added for explanation.
”The Tragic Muse?”
”That girl in Paris, whom we heard at the old actress's and afterwards met at the charming entertainment given by your cousin--isn't he?--the secretary of emba.s.sy.”
”Oh Peter's girl! Of course I remember her.”
”Don't call her Peter's; call her rather mine,” Nash said with easy rectification. ”I invented her. I introduced her. I revealed her.”
”I thought you on the contrary ridiculed and repudiated her.”
”As a fine, handsome young woman surely not--I seem to myself to have been all the while rendering her services. I said I disliked tea-party ranters, and so I do; but if my estimate of her powers was below the mark she has more than punished me.”
”What has she done?” Nick asked.
”She has become interesting, as I suppose you know.”
”How should I know?”
”Well, you must see her, you must paint her,” Nash returned. ”She tells me something was said about it that day at Madame Carre's.”
”Oh I remember--said by Peter.”
”Then it will please Mr. Sherringham--you'll be glad to do that. I suppose you know all he has done for Miriam?” Gabriel pursued.
”Not a bit, I know nothing about Peter's affairs,” Nick said, ”unless it be in general that he goes in for mountebanks and mimes and that it occurs to me I've heard one of my sisters mention--the rumour had come to her--that he has been backing Miss Rooth.”
”Miss Rooth delights to talk of his kindness; she's charming when she speaks of it. It's to his good offices that she owes her appearance here.”
”Here?” Nick's interest rose. ”Is she in London?”
”_D'ou tombez-vous_? I thought you people read the papers.”
”What should I read, when I sit--sometimes--through the stuff they put into them?”
”Of course I see that--that your engagement at your own variety-show, with its interminable 'turns,' keeps you from going to the others. Learn then,” said Gabriel Nash, ”that you've a great compet.i.tor and that you're distinctly not, much as you may suppose it, _the_ rising comedian. The Tragic Muse is the great modern personage. Haven't you heard people speak of her, haven't you been taken to see her?”
Nick bethought himself. ”I daresay I've heard of her, but with a good many other things on my mind I had forgotten it.”