There, to be sure, he was obliged to take off his shawl and appear in the unlucky dress-coat which, having been intended for Rossel's rounded proportions, hung very loosely about his shrunken limbs. However, he was not in the least embarrassed by this, but proceeded to explain to his friend, with the greatest seriousness, the advantage of having one's clothes too large. In the summer they were airy, for they caught the wind; in the winter they retained a larger supply of warm air--a movable wadding, as it were, between the body and the cloth--while they were much warmer in an unheated room, especially when covered by a shawl, on account of their having so much more material. He delivered this lecture over a cup of tea which Angelica had prepared for him, and which evidently restored to his inner man the warmth he had so long been without. As he was never more active than when he was working for others, the rough sketch of the equestrian portrait was completed in a few hours, and so skillfully set in Angelica's border of flowers that, as she expressed it, the whole picture looked "quite crazy enough," and they were able to proceed at once to the shading.
Over this common labor, that afforded them both great pleasure and gave occasion for innumerable jests, the forenoon had slipped away unheeded. Angelica proposed to take her dinner in her studio to-day, against which proposition Rosenbusch had nothing to object. She dispatched the janitor with a few secret commissions, and in a short time had improvised such an excellent meal that Rosenbusch burst out in great enthusiasm.
This was the first day for many weeks on which he had felt warm, and as if he had enough to eat. Consequently he only made a few weak protests when Angelica insisted upon furnishing him his meals so long as their common labor lasted, and even made as though he did not notice that she acted like a very Penelope, and again and again put off the completion of the work under one pretext or another. However, the picture was finished at last, and Rosenbusch, who had in the mean while grown quite plump, would have been obliged to fall back again on his fasting and brooding, had not his friend taken care to provide for him without his knowledge.