“How do you do, Mr Samways?” said the

Duchess.

“G—­good-afternoon,” said Paul, embarrassed both by the presence of a duchess in his studio and by his sudden discovery that he was touching up a sunset with a tube of carbolic tooth-paste.

“Our mutual friend, Lord Ernest Topwood, recommended me to come to you.”

Paul, who had never met Lord Ernest, but had once seen his name in a ha’penny paper beneath a photograph of Mr Arnold Bennett, bowed silently.

“As you probably guess, I want you to paint my daughter’s portrait.”

Paul opened his mouth to say that he was only a landscape painter, and then closed it again.  After all, it was hardly fair to bother her Grace with technicalities.

“I hope you can undertake this commission,” she said pleadingly.

“I shall be delighted,” said Paul.  “I am rather busy just now, but I could begin at two o’clock on Monday.”

“Excellent,” said the Duchess.  “Till Monday, then.”  And Paul, still clutching the tooth-paste, conducted her to her carriage.

Punctually at 3.15 on Monday Lady Hermione appeared.  Paul drew a deep breath of astonishment when he saw her, for she was lovely beyond compare.  All his skill as a landscape painter would be needed if he were to do justice to her beauty.  As quickly as possible he placed her in position and set to work.

“May I let my face go for a moment?” said Lady Hermione after three hours of it.

“Yes, let us stop,” said Paul.  He had outlined her in charcoal and burnt cork, and it would be too dark to do any more that evening.

“Tell me where you first met Lord Ernest?” she asked as she came down to the fire.

“At the Savoy, in June,” said Paul boldly.

Lady Hermione laughed merrily.  Paul, who had not regarded his last remark as one of his best things, looked at her in surprise.

“But your portrait of him was in the Academy in May!” she smiled.

Paul made up his mind quickly.

“Lady Hermione,” he said with gravity, “do not speak to me of Lord Ernest again.  Nor,” he added hurriedly, “to Lord Ernest of me.  When your picture is finished I will tell you why.  Now it is time you went.”  He woke the Duchess up, and made a few commonplace remarks about the weather.  “Remember,” he whispered to Lady Hermione as he saw them to their car.  She nodded and smiled.

The sittings went on daily.  Sometimes Paul would paint rapidly with great sweeps of the brush; sometimes he would spend an hour trying to get on his palette the exact shade of green bice for the famous Winchester emeralds; sometimes in despair he would take a sponge and wipe the whole picture out, and then start madly again.  And sometimes he would stop work altogether and tell Lady Hermione about his home-life in Worcestershire.  But always, when he woke the Duchess up at the end of the sitting, he would say, “Remember!” and Lady Hermione would nod back at him.