The aged rakishness of his appearance was set off by a youthful costume; he had disreputable grey hair and a disreputable sore, red nose; but the coat and the gesture, the outworks of the man, were still designed for show. Dick came up to his table and inquired if he might look at what the gentleman was doing. No one was so delighted as the Admiral.
'A bit of a thing,' said he. 'I just dash them off like that. I - I dash them off,' he added with a gesture.
'Quite so,' said Dick, who was appalled by the feebleness of the production.
'Understand me,' continued Van Tromp; 'I am a man of the world. And yet - once an artist always an artist. All of a sudden a thought takes me in the street; I become its prey:
it's like a pretty woman; no use to struggle; I must - dash it off.'
'I see,' said Dick.
'Yes,' pursued the painter; 'it all comes easily, easily to me; it is not my business; it's a pleasure. Life is my business - life - this great city, Paris - Paris after dark -its lights, its gardens, its odd corners. Aha!' he cried, 'to be young again! The heart is young, but the heels are leaden. A poor, mean business, to grow old! Nothing remains but the COUP D'OEIL, the contemplative man's enjoyment, Mr. -,' and he paused for the name.
'Naseby,' returned Dick.
The other treated him at once to an exciting beverage, and expatiated on the pleasure of meeting a compatriot in a foreign land; to hear him, you would have thought they had encountered in Central Africa. Dick had never found any one take a fancy to him so readily, nor show it in an easier or less offensive manner. He seemed tickled with him as an elderly fellow about town might be tickled by a pleasant and witty lad; he indicated that he was no precision, but in his wildest times had never been such a blade as he thought Dick.
Dick protested, but in vain. This manner of carrying an intimacy at the bayonet's point was Van Tromp's stock-in-trade. With an older man he insinuated himself; with youth he imposed himself, and in the same breath imposed an ideal on his victim, who saw that he must work up to it or lose the esteem of this old and vicious patron. And what young man can bear to lose a character for vice?
At last, as it grew towards dinner-time, 'Do you know Paris?'
asked Van Tromp.
'Not so well as you, I am convinced,' said Dick.
'And so am I,' returned Van Tromp gaily. 'Paris! My young friend - you will allow me? - when you know Paris as I do, you will have seen Strange Things. I say no more; all I say is, Strange Things. We are men of the world, you and I, and in Paris, in the heart of civilised existence. This is an opportunity, Mr. Naseby. Let us dine. Let me show you where to dine.'
Dick consented. On the way to dinner the Admiral showed him where to buy gloves, and made him buy them; where to buy cigars, and made him buy a vast store, some of which he obligingly accepted. At the restaurant he showed him what to order, with surprising consequences in the bill. What he made that night by his percentages it would be hard to estimate. And all the while Dick smilingly consented, understanding well that he was being done, but taking his losses in the pursuit of character as a hunter sacrifices his dogs. As for the Strange Things, the reader will be relieved to hear that they were no stranger than might have been expected, and he may find things quite as strange without the expense of a Van Tromp for guide. Yet he was a guide of no mean order, who made up for the poverty of what he had to show by a copious, imaginative commentary.
'And such,' said he, with a hiccup, 'such is Paris.'
'Pooh!' said Dick, who was tired of the performance.
The Admiral hung an ear, and looked up sidelong with a glimmer of suspicion.
'Good night,' said Dick; 'I'm tired.'
'So English!' cried Van Tromp, clutching him by the hand.
'So English! So BLASE! Such a charming companion! Let me see you home.'
'Look here,' returned Dick, 'I have said good night, and now I'm going. You're an amusing old boy: I like you, in a sense; but here's an end of it for to-night. Not another cigar, not another grog, not another percentage out of me.'
'I beg your pardon!' cried the Admiral with dignity.
'Tut, man!' said Dick; 'you're not offended; you're a man of the world, I thought. I've been studying you, and it's over.
Have I not paid for the lesson? AU REVOIR.'
Van Tromp laughed gaily, shook hands up to the elbows, hoped cordially they would meet again and that often, but looked after Dick as he departed with a tremor of indignation.
After that they two not unfrequently fell in each other's way, and Dick would often treat the old boy to breakfast on a moderate scale and in a restaurant of his own selection.
Often, too, he would lend Van Tromp the matter of a pound, in view of that gentleman's contemplated departure for Australia; there would be a scene of farewell almost touching in character, and a week or a month later they would meet on the same boulevard without surprise or embarrassment. And in the meantime Dick learned more about his acquaintance on all sides: heard of his yacht, his chaise and four, his brief season of celebrity amid a more confiding population, his daughter, of whom he loved to whimper in his cups, his sponging, parasitical, nameless way of life; and with each new detail something that was not merely interest nor yet altogether affection grew up in his mind towards this disreputable stepson of the arts. Ere he left Paris Van Tromp was one of those whom he entertained to a farewell supper; and the old gentleman made the speech of the evening, and then fell below the table, weeping, smiling, paralysed.