‘Ah!’ thought Hilary, ‘she has had experience already.’

Both he and his wife were accessible to cases of distress, but the nature of their charity was different.  Hilary was constitutionally unable to refuse his aid to anything that held out a hand for it.  Bianca (whose sociology was sounder), while affirming that charity was wrong, since in a properly constituted State no one should need help, referred her cases, like Stephen, to the “Society for the Prevention of Begging,” which took much time and many pains to ascertain the worst.

But in this case what was of importance was that the poor girl should have a meal, and after that to find out if she were living in a decent house; and since she appeared not to be, to recommend her somewhere better.  And as in charity it is always well to kill two birds with one expenditure of force, it was found that Mrs. Hughs, the seamstress, had a single room to let unfurnished, and would be more than glad of four shillings, or even three and six, a week for it.  Furniture was also found for her:  a bed that creaked, a washstand, table, and chest of drawers; a carpet, two chairs, and certain things to cook with; some of those old photographs and prints that hide in cupboards, and a peculiar little clock, which frequently forgot the time of day.  All these and some elementary articles of dress were sent round in a little van, with three ferns whose time had nearly come, and a piece of the plant called “honesty.”  Soon after this she came to “sit.”  She was a very quiet and passive little model, and was not required to pose half-draped, Bianca having decided that, after all, “The Shadow” was better represented fully clothed; for, though she discussed the nude, and looked on it with freedom, when it came to painting unclothed people, she felt a sort of physical aversion.

Hilary, who was curious, as a man naturally would be, about anyone who had fainted from hunger at his feet, came every now and then to see, and would sit watching this little half-starved girl with kindly and screwed-up eyes.  About his personality there was all the evidence of that saying current among those who knew him:  “Hilary would walk a mile sooner than tread on an ant.”  The little model, from the moment when he poured liqueur between her teeth, seemed to feel he had a claim on her, for she reserved her small, matter-of-fact confessions for his ears.  She made them in the garden, coming in or going out; or outside, and, now and then, inside his study, like a child who comes and shows you a sore finger.  Thus, quite suddenly: 

“I’ve four shillings left over this week, Mr. Dallison,” or, “Old Mr. Creed’s gone to the hospital to-day, Mr. Dallison.”

Her face soon became less bloodless than on that first evening, but it was still pale, inclined to colour in wrong places on cold days, with little blue veins about the temples and shadows under the eyes.  The lips were still always a trifle parted, and she still seemed to be looking out for what was coming, like a little Madonna, or Venus, in a Botticelli picture.  This look of hers, coupled with the matter-of-factness of her speech, gave its flavour to her personality....