Alpha Book

"You will spoil the whole picture," said Orsino, rather anxiously.
Gouache laughed.
"What harm if I do? I can restore it in five minutes--"
"Five minutes!"
"An hour, if you insist upon accuracy of statement," replied Gouache
with a shade of annoyance.
He had an idea, and like most people whom fate occasionally favours with
that rare commodity he did not like to be disturbed in the realisation
of it. He was already squeezing out quantities of tawny colours upon his
palette.
"I am a passive instrument," said Madame d'Aragona. "He does what he
pleases. These men of genius--what would you have? Yesterday a gown from
Worth--to-day a tiger's skin--indeed, I tremble for to-morrow."
She laughed a little and turned her head away.
"You need not fear," answered Gouache, daubing in his new idea with an
enormous brush. "Fashions change. Woman endures. Beauty is eternal.
There is nothing which may not be made becoming to a beautiful woman."
"My dear Gouache, you are insufferable. You are always telling me that I
am beautiful.


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