Later still, the essential woman in her came into its own again.  “I shall never be able to sit for you any more, Saint Michel,” she said regretfully.  “I’m nobody’s model—­now!”

She could see only her lost beauty—­the unthinking, radiant beauty of mere youth.  But Michael could see all that her voluntary renunciation and atonement had bestowed in its stead of more enduring significance.

He took her by the hand and led her to the mirror.

“There,” he said, a great content in his voice, “is the model for the greatest picture I shall ever paint—­the model for my ‘Madonna.’”