“True,” said the professor abstractedly.  “Where the elbow rests there should be a half-inverted urn flowing with water; but the drawing of that shoulder is so perfect—­as is your study of it—­that one guesses the missing forearm one cannot see, which clasped it.  Beautiful! beautiful!”

Suddenly he stopped, and turned his eyes almost searchingly on hers.

“You say you have never drawn from the human model, mademoiselle?”

“Never,” said the young girl innocently.

“True,” murmured the professor again.  “These are the classic ideal measurements.  There are no limbs like those now.  Yet it is wonderful!  And this gem, you say, is in England?”

“Yes.”

“Good!  I am going there in a few days.  I shall make a pilgrimage to see it.  Until then, mademoiselle, I beg you to break as many of my rules as you like.”

Three weeks later she found the professor one morning standing before her picture in her private studio.  “You have returned from England,” she said joyfully.

“I have,” said the professor gravely.

“You have seen the original subject?” she said timidly.

“I have not.  I have not seen it, mademoiselle,” he said, gazing at her mildly through his glasses, “because it does not exist, and never existed.”

The young girl turned pale.

“Listen.  I have go to England.  I arrive at the Park of Domesday.  I penetrate the beautiful, wild garden.  I approach the fountain.  I see the wonderful water, the exquisite light and shade, the lilies, the mysterious reeds—­beautiful, yet not as beautiful as you have made it, mademoiselle, but no statue—­no river god!  I demand it of the concierge.  He knows of it absolutely nothing.  I transport myself to the noble proprietor, Monsieur le Duc, at a distant chateau where he has collected the ruined marbles.  It is not there.”

“Yet I saw it,” said the young girl earnestly, yet with a troubled face.  “O professor,” she burst out appealingly, “what do you think it was?”

“I think, mademoiselle,” said the professor gravely, “that you created it.  Believe me, it is a function of genius!  More, it is a proof, a necessity!  You saw the beautiful lake, the ruined fountain, the soft shadows, the empty plinth, curtained by reeds.  You yourself say you feel there was ‘something wanting.’  Unconsciously you yourself supplied it.  All that you had ever dreamt of mythology, all that you had ever seen of statuary, thronged upon you at that supreme moment, and, evolved from your own fancy, the river god was born.  It is your own, chere enfant, as much the offspring of your genius as the exquisite atmosphere you have caught, the charm of light and shadow that you have brought away.  Accept my felicitations.  You have little more to learn of me.”

As he bowed himself out and descended the stairs he shrugged his shoulders slightly.  “She is an adorable genius,” he murmured.  “Yet she is also a woman.  Being a woman, naturally she has a lover—­this river god!  Why not?”