Here he walked up and down for some time, looking at the splendid blaze of the western sky and saying, as he had often said before, that this was certainly the country of sunsets.
There was something in these glorious deeps of fire that quickened his imagination; he always found images and promises in the western sky.

He thought of a good many things--of roaming about the world with Gertrude Wentworth; he seemed to see their possible adventures, in a glowing frieze, between the cloud-bars; then of what Eugenia had just been telling him.

He wished very much that Madame M; auunster would make a comfortable and honorable marriage.

Presently, as the sunset expanded and deepened, the fancy took him of making a note of so magnificent a piece of coloring.

He returned to his studio and fetched out a small panel, with his palette and brushes, and, placing the panel against a window-sill, he began to daub with great gusto.