"Anyway," insisted Quair, "here's what I think of 'em--"
"My model, yonder," said Drene, a slight shrug of contempt, "happens
to be feminine, and may also be human. Be decent enough to defer the
development of your rather tiresome theory."
The girl on the model-stand laughed outright at the rebuke,
stretched her limbs and body, and relaxed, launching a questioning
glance at Drene.
"All right; rest a bit," said the sculptor, smearing the bit of wax
he was pinching over the sketch before him.
He gave another twirl or two to the table, wiped his bony fingers on
a handful of cotton waste, picked up his empty pipe, and blew into
the stem, reflectively.
Quair, one of the associated architects of the new opera, who had
been born a gentleman and looked the perfect bounder, sauntered over
to examine the sketch. He was still red from the rebuke he had
invited.
Guilder, his senior colleague, got up from the lounge and walked
over also. Drene fitted the sketch into the roughly designed group,
where it belonged, and stood aside, sucking meditatively on his
empty pipe.
After a silence: "It's all right," said Guilder.
Quair remarked that the group seemed to lack flamboyancy. It is
true, however, that, except for Guilder's habitual restraint, the
celebrated firm of architects was inclined to express themselves
flamboyantly, and to interpret Renaissance in terms of Baroque.
"She's some girl," added Quair, looking at the lithe, modeled
figure, and then half turning to include the model, who had seated
herself on the lounge, and was now gazing with interest at the
composition sketched in by Drene for the facade of the new opera.
"Carpeaux and his eternal group--it's the murderous but inevitable
standard of comparison," mused Drene, with a whimsical glance at the
photograph on the wall.
"Carpeaux has nothing on this young lady," insisted Quair
flippantly; and he pivoted on his heel and sat down beside the
model. Once or twice the two others, consulting before the wax
group, heard the girl's light, untroubled laughter behind their
backs gaily responsive to Quair's wit. Perhaps Quair's inheritance
had been humor, but to some it seemed perilously akin to mother-wit.
The pockets of Guilder's loose, ill-fitting clothes bulged with
linen tracings and rolls of blue-prints. He and Drene consulted over
these for a while, semi-conscious of Quair's bantering voice and the
girl's easily provoked laughter behind them. And, finally: "All right, Guilder," said Drene briefly. And the firm of
celebrated architects prepared to evacuate the studio--Quair
exhibiting symptoms of incipient skylarking, in which he was said to
be at his best.