something of the sort. It is too bad, she had so set her heart on
showing you the _bambino_, as she calls him, herself."

But it proved that Nino also was out, having been taken for a walk; and
so Helen, who returned home at once, saw neither of them.




VII

THIS DEED UNSHAPES ME.
Measure for Measure; iv.--4.

Ninitta had not gone shopping. She was posing for Arthur Fenton, at his
studio. Even the presence of her boy could not wholly make up to the
Italian for the loss of all the old interest and excitement of her life
as a model. The boy was with his nurse or at the kindergarten for long
hours during which Ninitta, who had few of the resources with which an
educated woman would have filled her time, mingled longings for her old
life with blissful gloatings over Nino's beauty and cleverness. Her
husband was always kind, but since his marriage delicacy of sentiment
had made him shrink from having his wife pose even for himself, while
naturally no thought of her doing so for another would have been
entertained for a moment.

Ninitta had been so long in the life, to pose had been so large a part
of her very existence, that she hardly knew how to do without the old-
time flavor. Mrs. Fenton had perceived something of this without at all
appreciating the strength of the feeling of the sculptor's wife, and