Abyssus abyssum, the commonplace attracts the commonplace.
Toward the end of the sitting the stairway shook, the door was
violently thrust open by Joseph Bridau; he came like a whirlwind, his
hair flying. He showed his grand haggard face as he looked about him,
casting everywhere the lightning of his glance; then he walked round
the whole studio, and returned abruptly to Grassou, pulling his coat
together over the gastric region, and endeavouring, but in vain, to
button it, the button mould having escaped from its capsule of cloth.
"Wood is dear," he said to Grassou.
"Ah!"
"The British are after me" (slang term for creditors) "Gracious! do
you paint such things as that?"
"Hold your tongue!"
"Ah! to be sure, yes."
The Vervelle family, extremely shocked by this extraordinary
apparition, passed from its ordinary red to a cherry-red, two shades
deeper.
"Brings in, hey?" continued Joseph. "Any shot in your locker?"
"How much do you want?"
"Five hundred. I've got one of those bull-dog dealers after me, and if
the fellow once gets his teeth in he won't let go while there's a bit
of me left. What a crew!"
"I'll write you a line for my notary."
"Have you got a notary?"
"Yes."
"That explains to me why you still make cheeks with pink tones like a
perfumer's sign."
Grassou could not help coloring, for Virginie was sitting.
"Take Nature as you find her," said the great painter, going on with
his lecture.
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