AN AUTHOR’S MODEL.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XV, Issue XX, 16 November 1895, Page 611

AN AUTHOR’S MODEL.

HE girl brought me a card bearing the name of Duncan Felloes. I h®d reached that point in the process of ■XJSBy» narration —somewhere in the second volume —where imagination flags, and the still, • small voice of eui homo makes itself more obtrusively audible. The fair colour de rose which pervaded the initial chapters and scenes had passed away like the streak of dawn, and I was confronted with a sense of greyness and monotony which threatened to take all life out of the remainder of the novel. My hero, who started his career an apparently natural being, had developed, as time went on, an appalling righteousness of conduct, so that he was now less a man than a living replica of all the virtues. To paraphrase Stevenson, he had turned into a curate on my hands, and it was with increasing nervousness and mental strain that I continued, dav by day, to put my own dubious philosophy into his saintly mouth. I had ser’ous thoughts of ending the difficulty (and the novel) by marrying the heroine to the villain. This, I flattered myself, would have a depressing effect on the hero, but the sacrifice ultimately proved beyond my strength. The villain, however mistaken in his views, had at least acted consistently, and with a natural malignancy that inspired regard ; taken at his worst, he had never merited so crushing a fate. Another idea was to make him meet with a lingering death at the hands of the villain. This pleased me better, and I was turning the matter over in my mind when the girl came in with the card. ‘ What is it ?’ I asked, irritated by the interruption. ‘ltis a man,’ she said. *He is waiting in the hall.’ The girl is extremely literal, and on this account I had ventured to make use of her as a counter-irritant to my neurotic heroine. ‘ Well,’ I continued, ‘ what does he want? See if he can leave a message, and if not, tell him to call again during the afternoon.’ The girl obeyed, and shortly afterwards I heard the front door close. ‘ The gentleman will call again at four o’clock, sir,’ she said, when she re-appeared. ‘ Very good,’l replied. ‘ Show him in when he comes,’ and I turned again to the contemplation of the work be fore me. Punctually at four o’clock Duncan Felloes arrived Physically he struck me at first glance as an anomaly, and I watched him observantly in an endeavour to discover in what his peculiarity consisted. He was a man of average size, though by the way he carried himself his figure was made to appear both tall and short at intervals. This, lam aware, is a singular statement, but for sufficient reasons I shall make no attempt to explain it. He would, I • suppose, have been considered handsome by most people, yet, to my taste, his face lacked both distinction and distinctiveness. He was neither dark nor fair, yet, were such a thing even remotely feasible, I should like to say that he appeared fair or dark according to his moods. He was very evidently a creature of moods, the expression of his face — nay his whole person—varying vividly with every passing emotion. On the whole f found myself summing him up as a man who had come out of the forge of nature imperfectly adjusted ; or rather, perhaps, as a conjunction of two incongruous halves loosely welded, and with some of the joints yet visible, a view in which I was curiously confirmed by a contemplation of his forehead, as he passed his hand across it to arrange his hair. ‘ Mr Brown ?’ he asked, pausing in the centre of the room. I bowed, and indicated a chair. He sank into it and resting his elbow on the arms, laid the tips of his fingers carefully together. ‘ You wished to see me about ’ —l suggested, as he remained silent. ‘ Certainly,’ he said, rousing himself from a prolonged scrutiny of my face. ‘lam an author's model.’ ‘ A what ?’ I asked in astonishment. He smiled with a superior but wholly inoffensive air. The idea, I see, is new to you,’ he said, ‘ yet in this age of realism what could be more obvious. No artist of repute now dreams of limning even the most trivial object without that object before his eyes. Why should an author engaged in an immensely more difficult task, abstain from using the same safeguards to correctness and natural truth ?’ ‘ The cases are vastly different,’ I replied, in some amusement. *No artist is called upon to paint the inside of an hermetically sealed jar. ‘ Besides,’ I added, humourously, ‘every author is already sufficiently supplied with models in the persons of his friends and acquaintances, to say nothing of that perfect treasurehouse, his enemies.’ ‘ You do not deny the advantages of a living model, then ?’ he asked ‘ On the contrary,’ I replied, ‘ they are no doubt very preat.’ ‘ Then,’ he said, ‘ let us come to business. I offer myself for one of the characters in the novel on which you are now engaged.’ It would be untrue to say I was not surprised, even a trifled alarmed. Mania, I knew, takes a great number of eccentric forms. ‘ What is your nose ?’ I asked, to humour him. ‘ I have been engaged chiefly as the hero in ladies’ he replied modestly ! ‘ but I am anxious to better myself, and could assume almost any pose you required.’ * Of course,’ I said at a venture, ‘you can produce testimonials from some of your recent employers. I I should not care to engage a model without a written guarantee—in fact, I have made it a practice not to do so.’ *Of course,’ he replied cheerfully. ‘ I have the documents with me, and can give you entire satisfaction on the points of ability and good faith.’

I took the bulky envelope from him, and drew out its contents in a state of wonder bordering on mental paralysis. There was a number of letters from lady novelists, someof whose names I dimly remembered to have heard, and one from a writer of rather higher standing, whom I knew personally, and whose hand-writing I at once identified. All spoke of having employed Mr Duncan Felloes as model for certain characters, and to the entire satisfaction he had given in the parts assumed. Evidently I had yet to learn the inner mysteries of the novelist’s craft. ‘ Let me understand this,’ I said desperately. ‘ What exactly is the nature of the assistance you have reudered these ladies ?’ ‘ It has differed with the various cases,’ he replied, with a good-humoured tolerance of my ignorance. ‘ For instance, I can either pose from a verbal outline, or from work already partially completed. It depends on what is required. A good model can step in anywhere, even as late as the last revise.’ ‘Then,’ I said, grasping at a gleam of light in the midst of much mental darkness, ‘ if I were to give you a manuscript in which one of the characters was not entirely to my liking, you could locate and account for the defects ?’ He shook his head. ‘ You mistake,* he replied. ‘ A model does not advise, he merely poses. He would never, under any circumstances, offer a suggestion.’ ‘ Then what on earth is the use of him ?’ I asked. ‘ Surely you can see,’ he replied. ‘ Theamodel takes his cue from the author. If the resulting pos? is not satisfactory, then it is for the author to vary his ingredients, until the preconceived idea is materialized in the person of the model.’ ‘ That,’ I replied, ‘ seems to take for granted what must be very much open to question—the infallibility of the model.’ ‘lt does,’ he admitted; ‘ and speaking of myself, I may say that as a model I am infallible. However, your caution is perhaps natural, and I am willing to defer the discussion of terms until I have gained your confidence. I cannot speak more fairly than that.’ I had commenced the interview in a spirit of amused scepticism, which had been momentarily displaced by a pang of doubt as to my visitor’s sanity ; my final mood, however, was one of such extreme mental confusion that I felt to prolong the discussion would be to invite the complete overthrow of what little reason I had still remaining. I therefore, and in order to be rid of him, at once acceded to the arrangements he had proposed, and gathering together the whole of volume one, and such chapters of volume two as were in a state of completion, I thrust them into his hands, and rose to signify that the interview had terminated. • When shall you be ready ?’ I asked, as he stowed the papers away in his pockets. ‘You may expect me at eleven to-morrow morning,’ he replied at once. ‘So soon !’ I ejaculated, a trifle piqued. ‘ You may find the character rather more difficult than you imagine.’ He smiled easily, and, reiterating his assurance of being ready at the time stated, took his departure.

No sooner was he gone than I regretted my impulsiveness. The probability of the man being a fraud seemed overwhelming. A dozen different ways in which it would be possible for him to injure me jostled one another in my thoughts. At the best I should probably be

subjected to a system of blackmail until the manuscript was finally brought back into my own possession. My greatest trouble, however, when the apparent authenticity of the testimonials had occurred to me and somewhat quietened these apprehensions, was to reconcile the thing propose to be done with things possible of performance. The absurdity of the model’s pretensions was so enormous that even to think of them made me gasp, and the more I thought of them, the more monstrous did they appear. To work in my then state of mind was out of the question, and I spent the rest of the day in reading the Review of Reviews, and preparing myself for supernatural contingencies on the morrow. By eleven o’clock I was seated in my study, making a great pretence of work, but in reality counting the minutes until the arrival of my model. The clock had struck the quarter past the hour before a ring at the front door announced an arrival, and the girl came in to say that a gentleman desired to see me. I was a little surprised at this formality, as I had already given instructions that Mr Duncan Felloes was to be admitted at once, but the matter was accounted for a moment later when a young man, apparently a perfect stranger, entered the room, and quietly took a seat facing me. His age would be something between twenty-five and thirty. He was tall and fair, with a pair of unmistakeable blue eyes, and a figure that would not have disgraced Apollo. His features were delicately cut and refined, and the thin lips and general expression of countenance denoted asceticism of an advanced type. The one incongruous point about him was his attire ; while his face expressed, as I have said, an extreme austerity of temperament, his clothing, which comprised a loud check suit and a flaming tie dotted with green horse shoes, spoke of proclivities of a more worldly and frivolous order. ‘ To what am I indebted for this pleasure ?’ I asked, poitftedly. For answer my visitor thrust his hand into his pocket and handed me a card, on which was inscribed in a bold, back-stitch species of hand-writing the name Percival Loftus. ‘ Good heavens !’ I exclaimed, ‘ Can it be possible ?’ The young man in the chair regarded me with chill indifference. ‘And if it be possible,’ I added after a pause, ‘it is certainly all wrong.’ He shrugged his shoulders in a manner that would have been Satanic if it had not been apostolic. ‘I am letter-perfect,’ he said. ‘ Stand up,’ I requested. He did so, and I walked round him. ‘Surely,’ I remarked, ‘ you are mistaken about the costume.’ ‘ Chapter three, page thirty-seven,’ he replied readily. ‘ Well,’ I said, ‘ that will have to be amended.’ I took another look at him, noting the thin closed lips, the cold passionless expression. ‘ And yet. after all, it is less the clothes than the thing clothed,’ I mused. ‘Do you feel as bad as that inside ?’ He seemed both to understand and resent the question, though his resentment took no more definite form than the coldly given remark—* I am in your hands.’ I reflected a moment. ‘ Tell me,’ I said at length

• what are your feelings for the heroine ? You have professed to love her, do you really do so ?’ His face betrayed some embarrassment. * I cannot say that I care greatly for her,’ he replied.

‘ Still,’ I said, ’that may be her fault. Is there any direction in which you would like to see her improved ?’

He hesitated, and showed greater uneasiness. ’ Perhaps,’ I suggested, * if she were entirely altered, if a fresh heroine were substituted for the one to whom you are at present engaged ’ 'ldo not think it would make any difference,’ he confessed, with an introspective look. ‘I do not feel that it would. The fact is that I am constitutionally averse to marriage. It is unfortunate on her account, of course, but I must say that I do not consider her an entirely proper person. It appears to me highly indecent that she should continually persist in discussing matters with me which ought never be mentioned in public at all.’ His cheek was flushed, and his cold eye sparkled with restrained anger. ’Come, come,’ I remonstrated, ‘ you have taken part in the conversations willingly enough.’ * Never willingly,’ he replied, ‘ from a sense of politeness only.’

I felt myself growing warm, and, in order to avoid argument, picked up the manuscript he had brought with him, and read a passage carelessly here and there. Presently an idea occurred to me. The person before me was a creature of my own conception. I had made him, and it was conceivably in my power to remake him. At any rate the experiment was worth trying. I seated myself, and turning up the places in which Peicival Loftus appeared, was soon absorbed in the task of revising and, as I hoped, amending the character. This took me rather over an hour, my Model awaiting the issue with exemplary patience. Once he rose, and, moving across to a side-table, turned over the papers and periodicals with which it was laden. A copy of the Sporting Times apparently caused him some indignity. For he dropped it as though he had been burnt. Finally he settled on the Guardian, and, returning to his seat, perused that journal with every evidence of the deepest interest. ** At length I threw down my pen. ‘ Come,’ I said, ‘Mr Percival Loftus, I think you are rather brighter than you were. Have the goodness to take another look at yourself.’ The model took the manuscript and ran his eye through it. * This will take some study,’ he said dubiously. ‘ Very good,’ I replied. ‘ Shall we say the same hour to-morrow morning.’ He assented, and begging the loan of the Guardian, took his leave. I was now prepared for startling contingencies, so that I was not surprised when the next morning, following on the announcement ‘another gentleman to see you sir,’ I found certain radical alterations in the personal appearance of my model. His clothes—a slightly modified edition of the check of the previous day—were the least part of this change, which, in some inexplicable fashion, had wrought its deepest ravages in his face. I say ravages advisedly, for it was impossible to disguise from myself the fact that the man was to a certain extent corrupted and debased. His cheeks had taken flesh, his lips developed a sensuous droop, and over his whole face there hung a faint, indefinite veil of coarseness, the sort of intangible not-to-be-localised flaw, which creeps into the countenance of the originally virtuous man who has put his lips to the cup of sinful pleasure. Yet, curiously enough, something of the ascetic still lingered, revealing itself now in the tones of his voice, now in a momentary flash of the cold eyes, when, as by a revelation, the Percival Loftus of the previous day stood before me. ‘ Well, what are your ideas now ?’ I asked, when we had shaken hands. • I am inclined to take a more moderate view,’ he replied, throwing the Guardian carelessly on the table. • It does not do to confine one’s attention to one side of a question only. ’ ‘ And as regards marriage ?’ I inquired. ’ I am distinctly a marrying man,’ he replied, selfcon templatively. I nodded encouragement. ‘ And the heroine —what are your s»ntiments with regard to her?’ He was silent for several seconds. ‘ The fact is lam not consistent,’ he said at length, * far from it. On the whole, as I have said, I am a marrying man, but I am subject to relapses when I might be almost anything. No, 1 am a damned long way from being consistent, and it’s no use mincing the matter.’ ‘ Excuse me,’ I said, * you used a word for which I believe you have no warrant so far as I am concerned. It will be as well to keep religiously to the book.’ * Chapter eight,’ he said quickly, ‘page eighty-six.’ ‘True,’ I admitted, ‘but the occasion, as you must feel, was a special one. However, I will look you through again, and endeavour to remove your inconsistencies. You will find the last issue of the Guardian on the table.’ I again devoted myself to a revision of the manuscript and the model, after a careless glance at the periodicals I had recommended, and a furtive perusal of a few paragraphs in the Sporting Times, settled down on Lika Joko and some back numbers of the Idler. I gave him a good number of alterations and additions to study over, and sent him home, impressing him with the necessity for adhering with the utmost exactness to his book. The following day he smelt rather stronglv of tobacco, but had become pe: fectly reconciled to a marriag# with the heroine. ‘ She is a deuced nice little piece, Brown,’ he said familiarly, ‘ pretty figure and all that. You can put up the banns as soon as you like.’ He swore now and again with great cheerfulness, read the Sporting Times openly, offered me the odds on the Derby, and on leaving suggested a glass of wine at the nearest restaurant. Being now busily engaged in the completion of volume two, 1 was able to dispense with his services for a week or more, by which time I had got to the end of the volume. His appearance, when I next saw him, gave evident signs of deterioration. His manner was familiar almost tocoarseness, and his breath exhaled acontinuous odour of strong spirits, which was decidedly not in the compact. I reproached him with this, and hinted a general neglect of his duties.

‘ Not a bit of it,’ he declared indignantly. ‘ Where is the bally manuscript ? I can show you authority for every dashed thing. ’ ‘ That may be,’ I replied, ‘ but you are merely on the surface of the part; you do not read into it.’ ‘ Do not be too sure of that,’ he retorted, with a queer look, that for the moment silenced me. I continued giving him the chapters as fast as they were completed, and he continued visiting me with every addition duly assimilated, and at every fresh visit he appeared to me rather more degraded than before. His breath became more fiery, the odour of tobacco from hisclothes more rank ; he grew more careless in his habits, arriving with his tie in disorder, his coat and hat unbrushed. Later, as the end of the novel approached, his conduct passed all bounds He fell into a habit of dropping in at uncertain hours of the day and night, frequently in dressc'othes, as though straight from some social festivity. On these occasions he would throw himself full length on the sofa and fall asleep, a course of action which his condition usually rendered advisable. In vain I endeavoured to arrest his descent by writing into his part the most moral and elevating sentiments of which I was capable. However conscientiously this was done, a wholly undreamed of under-current of diablerie seemed, in his view, to permeate the result, and thus add but additional fuel to the already glowing fire of his debaucheries. In vain I declared my entire innocence of evil ittention, and attempted to show him his error. As a last resort he would give me one of his queer looks, which though ftacomprehensible to me, never failed to inspire me with a conviction of personal guiltiness. One evening, after having lain on the sofa, breathing heavily, for the greater part of the afternoon, he awoke and turned his face towards me.

‘ Come,’ I said cheerfully, for the last sheet or two had pleased and put me in a good humour. ‘lam on the point of marrying you. Do you consider yourself in a fit state for the ceremony ?’ ' Oh, hatig marriage !’ he exclaimed irritably, raising himself to a sitting posture. ‘ For God’s sake, old man, give me a soda.’ I complied with the request, and he threw himself back with a sigh of satisfaction. ‘ I thought we had agreed that you were a marrying man,’ I said presently. He laughed cynically. ‘So I am, in a sense,’ he replied. ‘ I say, look here, couldn’t we make this a case of free-love ? It’s quite the thing, you know; up to date, and all that. Couldn’t we ?’ he broke off eagerly, ‘ No,’ I replied, shortly, ‘we couldn’t. lam surprised that you should suggest such a thing He laughed again, but his face betrayed disappointment. ‘ You ought not to be surprised,’ he said, sulkily. ‘ Why not ?’ I asked. ‘ Because such as I am you have made me,’ he replied, tossing on to his back, and locking his hands beneath his head. ‘ Nonsense !’ I ejaculated. ‘ And that reminds me of something I have intended to say to you for a month past. The present seems as good occasion as any to point out to you that you are a failure—a dismal failure.’ ‘ How’s that ?’ he asked, without stirring. ‘You are no more like the Percival Loftus of the novel than you are like—the Queen of England,’ I retorted, incoherently. * You have utterly failed to materialise even a detail of that young man’s character.’ Think so ?’ he asked, indifferently. ‘I am sure of it,’ I replied. ‘ There is absolutely no point of similarity.’ He was silent for a while, then laughed as though something amused him. ‘ It’s funny you don’t see,’ he said. ‘ See what ?’ X inquired. ‘ Oh well, never mind just now,’ he answered, raising himself to his feet. ‘We are near the end, aren’t we ?’ ‘ Another couple of chapters,’ I replied. He yawned and glanced at his watch. ‘ I’ll look in for them to morrow,' he said, picking up his coat and hat. I was not sorry to see him go, for I was in the humour for work, and the final chapters were already so clearly developed in my thoughts that the operation of writing then: was really almost purely mechanical. The following day he called, looking terribly done up, and took away the last of the manuscript with him. Why, regarding the utter failure of my model, I chose to continue what I felt to have been from the first a ridiculous experiment, and how it was I continued up to the last to take an interest in his efforts, are points I shall not attempt to explain to the reader, since I have never been able to elucidate them for myself. It must suffice to assert that I looked forward to his final pose with as much curiosity as I had felt at any previous stage of the business. Three days elapsed before I again saw him. I had been spending the evening at the house of a friend, and returned home, shortly after eleven, to find him stretched in his usual position on the sofa. The fire in the grate had burnt low, and the gas was turned down, as though the room were unoccupied. Indeed, I had at first supposed it to be so, and it was not until I had screwed up the lights that I discovered the presence of my model. The bundle of manuscript he had brought with him lay on the desk, and I added it to the remainder of the work with a feeling of relief that I had done with his services, and could now dismiss him to the darkness from which he had so suddenly appeared. I crossed the room, and, turning the bracket so that the light fell on his face, looked down on him with a still unsubdued curiosity. As I did so I started back. A sense of loathing, approaching in its acuteness to horror, took possession of my mind, and repelled, yet fascinated, I stood gazing on the form beneath me. Had I been blind ? Or was there a real change ? Could this puny, misshapen creature, with its dull and animal countenance, its flabby and colourless cheeks, its low and receding brow, its repulsive air of brutality, be the man who for months past had been almost a daily visitor in my house ? I trembled as I asked myself the question. Then, in swift re-action, laid my hand roughly on bis arm.

He awoke almost at once. ' What is it ?’ he asked, without showing surprise. ‘ I have had enough of this,’ I replied stormily. ‘ Let me know what I owe you, and then go.’ ‘What you owe me,’ he repeated, quietly, apparently without noticing my excitement. He raised himself to a sitting posture, and looked thoughtfully beyond me into the fire. ‘ That depends,’ he said. 'lf it depends on the amount of advantage I have derived from your visits,’ I retorted, sharply, ‘then nothing.’ ‘lt might depend on something else,’ he remarked, musingly. ‘lt might depend on the amount of dfsad vantage I have derived.’ I was puzzled, and at a loss for a retort. I stood looking down on him in silence. ■You see,’ he continued in the same thoughtful manner, and with the same abstracted gaze, ‘ there are two sides to the matter, just as there are two sides to the creation of a world.’

I pondered this a moment, but failing to see its relevancy to the matter in hand, returned abruptly to the question of fact. • The only point that affects me,’ I said, • is that your services are of no value to me. So far from proving a help you have been an actual hindrance. The whole

thing in point of fact has been a farce, and I wish to end it now, at once You understand me ?’ ‘No,’ he said, good-temperedly, ‘I don’t. What do you complain of? As you fashioned me, so I am.’ This was the second occasion on which he had made very much the same remark, and the re-iteration exasperated me. * Come,’ I said, ‘ I have already answered you on that point, but if you desire a plainer answer I will give you one. You have never from first to last had the faintest glimmering of understanding of the character you have pretended to assume. It is not in your nature to appreciate, or even to imitate afar off, the character of a gentleman.’ For the first time he raised his head and looked full at me, so queer, so intent a look, that a cold shiver as at approaching disaster ran down my spine. ‘ I am the man,’ he said steadily. ‘ What man ?’ I gasped. He pointed to the pile of manuscript on the table. * Read,’ he said, ‘ and you will see.’ Mastered by the superior force of will that shone from his eyes, I moved, like a lamb to the table. A strange curiosity overpowered me. I sat down, and in a few minutes was absorbed in the perusal of my own work. An hour or two back I had glanced through the sheets and yawned. I had read page after page without an idea of their meaning, or a care whether they meant anything at all. The book had become, as it were a condition of my mind, and memory forestalled each passage only to blot it on the instant from my consciousness. But now the case was different. Had every memory of the long weariness of construction been swept entirely from my brain,.l could not have entered on my task with greater freshness. Even in the first paragraph something, hitherto unnoticed, riveted my attention, and thenceforward I read on with mind awake and keenly responsive to every word. The hours sped by unheeded. Once, disturbed by a growing chilliness, I rose, and absently replenished the fire. As in a dream, I was conscious of the model on his back on the sofa, his hands locked beneath his head. I was absorbed wholly in my own imaginings, and for the moment the man’s connection with myself was forgotten. I was absorbed—yes—but I was also appalled. A lurking sense of horror underlay the fascination that possessed me. I knew that presently other feelings would prevail, the horror would rise to the surface, I should wrestle in the throes of a desperate anguish, but at present the fascination was a delight to be hugged. Here and there I passed by whole pages, even chapters, unread, the furyol my curiosity burning through and mastering them, as by a supernatural intuition, but wherever one man appeared—the one man who stood out a real and living thing in a whirl of shadows—there I lingered, there I dwelt and jjondered, interested to the roots of my being. For in the choice of realities I had thrown in my lot with Satan, and the despicable figure moved through the book, inspired with the breath of life, as

though a man should burst alive into the strange dimness of his own dream.

At length the end came. I turned the last leaf, and for many minutes sat motionless, lost in a whirl of thought. Then in a moment came re-action and revulsion. A cold shudder ran through me. I started and looked around. The model lay on the sofa motionless, like one dead. On the mantelpiece the clock marked a few minutes to six. The fire in the grate still jetted out intermittent flames. I rose stiffly, and, crossing the room, sat down before it, the papers still iu my hands. Slowly I lifted the firstquire, and, rending it in two, cast it on the flames. As 1 did so the model, for the first time for many hours, changed his position. I rent another quire and threw it on top of the first.

The silence of the night, or rather morning, was suddenly broken by a sharp cry. I turned and saw the Model on his feet, his face white, and convulsed as though with terror. * What are you doing ?’ he cried sharply. I tore another quire and threw it on the blaze. ‘ You were right,’ I said. He moved unsteadily towards me, his eyes starting from their sockets. * For God’s sake stop ! ’ he whispered hoarsely.

I was dimly conscious of surprise, but my mind, strained by the long and harrowing task of the night, took no note. I shook my head, and continued rapidly throwing the sheets into the fire. The flames burst out anew, filling the room with grotesque and swiftly moving shadows. Suddenly he darted forward, and made a grasp at the packet. I shut my knees together with a sharp movement, and tearing the papers from his fingers, hurled them altogether into the blaze. For a moment he stood like one stricken to stone, then with a dreadful cry, and clutching at his throat and chest, he reeled and fell to the floor. The event, so unlooked for, aroused me to a sense of realities, and I sprang to my feet. Ou examination I found the model still breathed, yet even as I satisfied myself on this point the heart beneath my hand fluttered and stilled. I left him where he lay and ransacked the cupboard for stimulants, only to find that every bottle was empty. Again I returned to him. His face during the brief interval had changed to a hideous blackness, and his whole body seemed to my paralysed gaze to have shrunk and withered. I loosened the collar at his throat, supported his head on a footstool, and hastening downstairs to the cellars, succeeded at length in securing a bottle of brandy. With this I returned to the study. In the centre of the room I paused and looked stupidly around. Through the slits in the Venetian blinds stole the first faint evidences of dawn. The papers in the grate were red through to the heart, and had almost ceased to flame. The model was nowhere to be seen.

Samuel Cliall White.