The gentleman replied by kissing the fingers of his right hand, and
wafting the kiss the length of his arm towards Heaven. As who should
say, I devote him to the celestial Powers as an immortal artist!
'But he is a man of family,' he added. 'His connections are of the best.
He is more than an artist: he is highly connected. He may, in effect,
have repudiated his connections, proudly, impatiently, sarcastically (I
make the concession of both words); but he has them. Sparks that have
been struck out during our intercourse have shown me this.'
'Well! I hope,' said the lofty gentleman, with the air of finally
disposing of the subject, 'that the lady's indisposition may be only
temporary.' 'Sir, I hope so.' 'Mere fatigue, I dare say.'
'Not altogether mere fatigue, sir, for her mule stumbled to-day, and
she fell from the saddle. She fell lightly, and was up again without
assistance, and rode from us laughing; but she complained towards
evening of a slight bruise in the side. She spoke of it more than once,
as we followed your party up the mountain.'
The head of the large retinue, who was gracious but not familiar,
appeared by this time to think that he had condescended more than
enough. He said no more, and there was silence for some quarter of an
hour until supper appeared.
With the supper came one of the young Fathers (there seemed to be no
old Fathers) to take the head of the table. It was like the supper of
an ordinary Swiss hotel, and good red wine grown by the convent in more
genial air was not wanting. The artist traveller calmly came and took
his place at table when the rest sat down, with no apparent sense upon
him of his late skirmish with the completely dressed traveller.
'Pray,' he inquired of the host, over his soup, 'has your convent many
of its famous dogs now?' 'Monsieur, it has three.'
'I saw three in the gallery below. Doubtless the three in question.' The
host, a slender, bright-eyed, dark young man of polite manners, whose
garment was a black gown with strips of white crossed over it like
braces, and who no more resembled the conventional breed of Saint
Bernard monks than he resembled the conventional breed of Saint Bernard
dogs, replied, doubtless those were the three in question.
'And I think,' said the artist traveller, 'I have seen one of them
before.' It was possible. He was a dog sufficiently well known. Monsieur might
have easily seen him in the valley or somewhere on the lake, when he
(the dog) had gone down with one of the order to solicit aid for the
convent. 'Which is done in its regular season of the year, I think?'