Madame Carlotti smiled with her teeth and drank some very strong coffee.

'It ees deefficult,' she said, with that seductive formation of the
lips used by her countrywomen when speaking English, 'for a magnet to
attract putty. Still--there ees the American. At least I shall not be
altogether bored.'


IV.

That noon, in a restaurant of Chelsea, the district of Pensioners and
Bohemians, two young gentlemen, considerably in need of renovation by
both tailor and barber, met at a table and nodded gloomily. One was
Johnston Smyth, an artist, who, finding himself possessed neither of a
technique nor of the industry to acquire one, had evolved a
super-futurist style that had made him famous in a night. He was
spoken of as 'a new force;' it was prophesied that English Art would
date from him. Unfortunately his friends neglected to buy his
paintings, and as his art was a vivid one, consisting of vast
quantities of colour splashed indiscriminately on the canvas, it took
more than his available funds to purchase the accessories of his
calling. He was tall, with expressive arms that were too long for his
sleeves, and a nose that would have done credit to a field-marshal.

The other was Norton Pyford, the modernist composer, who had developed
the study of discord to such a point that his very features seemed to
lack proportion, and when he smiled his face presented a lop-sided
appearance. He had given a recital which set every one who is any one
in London talking. There was but one drawback--they talked so much
that he could persuade no one to listen, and he carried his discords