though a desultory ministrant, and had in a wonderful degree the
sentiment de la pose. It was uncultivated, instinctive, a part of
the happy instinct that had guided him to my door and helped him to
spell out my name on the card nailed to it. He had had no other
introduction to me than a guess, from the shape of my high north
window, seen outside, that my place was a studio and that as a
studio it would contain an artist. He had wandered to England in
search of fortune, like other itinerants, and had embarked, with a
partner and a small green hand-cart, on the sale of penny ices.
The ices had melted away and the partner had dissolved in their
train. My young man wore tight yellow trousers with reddish
stripes and his name was Oronte. He was sallow but fair, and when
I put him into some old clothes of my own he looked like an
Englishman. He was as good as Miss Churm, who could look, when
requested, like an Italian.



CHAPTER IV



I thought Mrs. Monarch's face slightly convulsed when, on her
coming back with her husband, she found Oronte installed. It was
strange to have to recognise in a scrap of a lazzarone a competitor
to her magnificent Major. It was she who scented danger first, for
the Major was anecdotically unconscious. But Oronte gave us tea,
with a hundred eager confusions--he had never been concerned in so
queer a process--and I think she thought better of me for having at
last an "establishment." They saw a couple of drawings that I had