But while those who were dying to be painted by him must
often wait for years, and put up with manners none too polite, there were
others who avenged them; women, a few, very few women, whom the great
man, strange to say, sighed to paint, and sighed in vain. Such women were
generally women of a certain age; none of your soft-cheeked beauties. And
Lady Tatham was one of them. The great artist had begged her to let
herself be painted by him. And Victoria had negligently replied that,
perhaps, at Duddon, some day, there might be time. Several reminders,
launched from the Chelsea studio, had not brought her to the point; but
now for her son's sake she had actually named a time; and a jubilant
telegram from London had clenched the bargain. The great man was to
arrive in a fortnight from now, for a week's visit; and Tatham had in his
pocket a note from Lady Tatham to Mrs. Penfold requesting the pleasure of
her company and that of her two daughters at dinner, to meet Mr. Louis
Delorme, the day after his arrival.
And all this, because, at a mention of the illustrious name, Lydia had
looked up with a flutter of enthusiasm. "You know him? How lucky for you!
He's _wonderful_! I? Oh, no. How should I? I saw him once in the
distance--he was giving away prizes. I didn't get one--alack! That's the
nearest I shall ever come to him."
Tatham chuckled happily as he thought of it.
"She shall sit next the old boy at dinner, and she shall talk to him just
as much as she jolly well pleases.
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