She had her empire; why must she seek out a man who had but his art and his youth, and steal those?
Women are so insatiate, look you; though they held all the world, they would not rest if one mote in the air swam in sunshine, free of them! It was the first year I touched triumph that I saw her.

They began for the first time to speak of me; it was the little painting of Cigarette, as a child of the army, that did it.

Ah, God! I thought myself already so famous! Well, she sent for me to take her picture, and I went.

I went and I painted her as Cleopatra--by her wish.

Ah! it was a face for Cleopatra--the eyes that burn your youth dead, the lips that kiss your honor blind! A face--my God! how beautiful! She had set herself to gain my soul; and as the picture grew, and grew, and grew, so my life grew into hers till I lived only by her breath.