“Ah!” he exclaimed, without looking around, “it is my friend the doctor, my friend Sarson, M.D. of London, L.R.C.P. and all the rest of it.  He brings with him the odour of the sick room.  For a moment or two, just for a moment, dear friend, do not disturb me.  Do not bring any alien thoughts into my brain.  I am absorbed, you see—­absorbed.  It is a strange problem of colour, this.”

He was silent for several moments, glancing repeatedly out of the window and back to his canvas, painting all the time with swift and delicate precision.

“Meekins, who stands behind my chair,” Mr. Fentolin continued, “even Meekins is entranced.  He has a soul, my friend Sarson, although you might not think it.  He, too, sees sometimes the colour in the skies, the glitter upon the sands, the clear, sweet purity of those long stretches of virgin water.  Meekins, I believe, has a soul, only he likes better to see these things grow under his master’s touch than to wander about and solve their riddles for himself.”

The man remained perfectly immovable.  Not a feature twitched.  Yet it was a fact that, although he stood where Mr. Fentolin could not possibly observe him, he never removed his gaze from the canvas.

“You see, my medical friend, that there has been a great tide in the night, following upon the flood?  Even our small landmarks are shifted.  Soon, in my little carriage, I shall ride down to the Tower.  I shall sit there, and I shall watch the sea.  I think that this evening, with the turn of the tide, the spray may reach even to my windows there.  I shall paint again.  There is always something fresh in the sea, you know—­always something fresh in the sea.  Like a human face—­angry or pleased, sullen or joyful.  Some people like to paint the sea at its calmest and most beautiful.  Some people like to see happy faces around them.  It is not every one who appreciates the other things.  It is not quite like that with me, eh, Sarson?”

His hand fell to his side.  Momentarily he had finished his work.  He turned around and eyed the doctor, who stood in taciturn silence.

“Answer.  Answer me,” he insisted.

The doctor’s gloomy face seemed darker still.

“You have spoken the truth, Mr. Fentolin,” he admitted.  “You are not one of the vulgar herd who love to consort with pleasure and happiness.  You are one of those who understand the beauty of unhappiness—­in others,” he added, with faint emphasis.

Mr. Fentolin smiled.  His face became almost like the face of one of those angels of the great Italian master.

“How well you know me!” he murmured.  “My humble effort, Doctor —­how do you like it?”

The doctor bent over the canvas.

“I know nothing about art,” he said, a little roughly.  “Your work seems to me clever—­a little grotesque, perhaps; a little straining after the hard, plain things which threaten.  Nothing of the idealist in your work, Mr. Fentolin.”