"Svengali, Svengali, Svengali!"
At last she asked Durien if he knew him.
"Parbleu! Si je connais Svengali!"
"Quest-ce que t'en penses?"
"Quand il sera mort, ça fera une fameuse crapule de moins!"
Carrel's atelier (or painting-school) was in the Rue Notre Dame des Potirons St. Michel, at the end of a large court-yard, where there were many large dirty windows facing north, and each window let the light of heaven into a large dirty studio.
The largest of these studios, and the dirtiest, was Carrel's, where some thirty or forty art students drew and painted from the nude model every day but Sunday from eight till twelve, and for two hours in the afternoon, except on Saturdays, when the afternoon was devoted to much-needed Augean sweepings and cleanings.
One week the model was male, the next female, and so on, alternating throughout the year.
A stove, a model-throne, stools, boxes, some fifty strongly built low chairs with backs, a couple of score easels and many drawing-boards, completed the mobilier.
The bare walls were adorned with endless caricatures —des charges– in charcoal and white chalk; and also the scrapings of many palettes – a polychromous decoration not unpleasing.
For the freedom of the studio and the use of the model each student paid ten francs a month to the massier, or senior student, the responsible bellwether of the flock; besides this, it was expected of you, on your entrance or initiation, that you should pay for your footing – your bienvenue– some thirty, forty, or fifty francs, to be spent on cakes and rum punch all round.
Every Friday Monsieur Carrel, a great artist, and also a stately, well-dressed, and most courteous gentleman (duly decorated with the red rosette of the Legion of Honor), came for two or three hours and went the round, spending a few minutes at each drawing-board or easel – ten or even twelve when the pupil was an industrious and promising one.
He did this for love, not money, and deserved all the reverence with which he inspired this somewhat irreverent and most unruly company, which was made up of all sorts.
Graybeards who had been drawing and painting there for thirty years and more, and remembered other masters than Carrel, and who could draw and paint a torso almost as well as Titian or Velasquez – almost, but not quite – and who could never do anything else, and were fixtures at Carrel's for life.
Younger men who in a year or two, or three or five, or ten or twenty, were bound to make their mark, and perhaps follow in the footsteps of the master; others as conspicuously singled out for failure and future mischance – for the hospital, the garret, the river, the Morgue, or, worse, the traveller's bag, the road, or even the paternal counter.
Irresponsible boys, mere rapins, all laugh and chaff and mischief – "blague et bagout Parisien"; little lords of misrule – wits, butts, bullies; the idle and industrious apprentice, the good and the bad, the clean and the dirty (especially the latter) – all more or less animated by a certain esprit de corps, and working very happily and genially together, on the whole, and always willing to help each other with sincere artistic counsel if it were asked for seriously, though it was not always couched in terms very flattering to one's self-love.
Before Little Billee became one of this band of brothers he had been working for three or four years in a London art school, drawing and painting from the life; he had also worked from the antique in the British Museum – so that he was no novice.
As he made his début at Carrel's one Monday morning he felt somewhat shy and ill at ease. He had studied French most earnestly at home in England, and could read it pretty well, and even write it and speak it after a fashion; but he spoke it with much difficulty, and found studio French a different language altogether from the formal and polite language he had been at such pains to learn. Ollendorff does not cater for the quartier latin. Acting on Taffy's advice – for Taffy had worked under Carrel – Little Billee handed sixty francs to the massier for his bienvenue– a lordly sum – and this liberality made a most favorable impression, and went far to destroy any little prejudice that might have been caused by the daintiness of his dress, the cleanliness of his person, and the politeness of his manners. A place was assigned to him, and an easel and a board; for he elected to stand at his work and begin with a chalk drawing. The model (a male) was posed, and work began in silence. Monday morning is always rather sulky everywhere (except perhaps in judee). During the ten minutes' rest three or four students came and looked at Little Billee's beginnings, and saw at a glance that he thoroughly well knew what he was about, and respected him for it.
Nature had given him a singularly light hand – or rather two, for he was ambidextrous, and could use both with equal skill; and a few months' practice at a London life school had quite cured him of that purposeless indecision of touch which often characterizes the prentice hand for years of apprenticeship, and remains with the amateur for life. The lightest and most careless of his pencil strokes had a precision that was inimitable, and a charm that specially belonged to him, and was easy to recognize at a glance. His touch on either canvas or paper was like Svengali's on the key-board – unique.
As the morning ripened little attempts at conversation were made – little breakings of the ice of silence. It was Lambert, a youth with a singularly facetious face, who first woke the stillness with the following uncalled-for remarks in English very badly pronounced:
"Av you seen my fahzere's ole shoes?"
"I av not seen your fahzere's ole shoes."
Then, after a pause:
"Av you seen my fahzere's ole 'at?"
"I av not seen your fahzere's old 'at!"
Presently another said, "Je trouve qu'il a une jolie tête, l'Anglais."
But I will put it all into English:
"I find that he has a pretty head – the Englishman! What say you, Barizel?"
"Yes; but why has he got eyes like brandy-balls, two a penny?"
"Because he's an Englishman!"
"Yes; but why has he got a mouth like a guinea-pig, with two big teeth in front like the double blank at dominos?"
"Because he's an Englishman!"
"Yes; but why has he got a back without any bend in it, as if he'd swallowed the Colonne Vendôme as far up as the battle of Austerlitz?"
"Because he's an Englishman!"
And so on, till all the supposed characteristics of Little Billee's outer man were exhausted. Then:
"Papelard!"
"What?"
"I should like to know if the Englishman says his prayers before going to bed."
"Ask him."
"Ask him yourself!"
"I should like to know if the Englishman has sisters; and if so, how old and how many and what sex."
"Ask him."
"Ask him yourself!"
"I should like to know the detailed and circumstantial history of the Englishman's first love, and how he lost his innocence!"
"Ask him," etc., etc., etc.
Little Billee, conscious that he was the object of conversation, grew somewhat nervous. Soon he was addressed directly.
"Dites donc, l'Anglais?"
"Kwaw?" said Little Billee.
"Avez-vous une sœur?''
"Wee."
"Est-ce qu'elle vous ressemble?"
"Nong."
"C'est bien dommage! Est-ce qu'elle dit ses prières, le soir, en se couchant?"
A fierce look came into Little Billee's eyes and a redness to his cheeks, and this particular form of overture to friendship was abandoned.
Presently Lambert