IF THE CAREER of Theodore Keller advanced considerably in the eight years after his visit to Coney Island, it was due mainly to two circumstances. The first was that, at the end of the summer of the terrible riots, he had decided to go down to cover the later stages of the Civil War. The second had been the patronage of Frank Master.

And yet now, on a warm afternoon in October, on the very brink of the most important exhibition of his life, in the splendid gallery near Astor Place that Master had hired for the occasion, he was about to lose his temper with his patron.

“You’ll ruin everything!” he cried to Master in exasperation.

“I’m telling you,” said Master firmly, “it’s what you need to do.”

They’d already had one disagreement. Theodore had made no objection when Master suggested that one of the portrait photographs he’d taken of Lily de Chantal be included. But when his patron had warned him not to include the picture of Madame Restell, Theodore had been furious.

“It’s one of the best pictures I ever took,” he’d protested.

The portrait of Madame Restell had been a masterpiece. He’d gone to her house, found a huge, ornate armchair, and placed her in it, like Cleopatra on her throne. With her great bull-like face, she’d stared belligerently at the camera, as terrifying as a minotaur. Placed beside even General Grant, her portrait would have knocked his off the wall.

“Theo,” Frank Master had told him, “that woman is now so notorious, they can’t even sell the plot next to her house—on Fifth Avenue, if you please! No one will live there. If you put her portrait up, you’ll never get another commission.” Even Hetty Master had reluctantly agreed. When Madame Restell discovered she wouldn’t be in the show, she had been furious.

And there were other aspects of the exhibition that had worried Master: the political pieces.

“Be careful, Theo,” he’d said. “I don’t want you to do yourself harm.” His counsel was possibly wise, but Theodore didn’t give a damn, and he’d refused to budge.

“I’m telling the truth,” he’d said. “That’s what artists do.”

In this he’d had one unexpected ally. Hetty Master. “He’s quite right,” she’d told her husband. “He should include any photographs he likes. Except Madame Restell, perhaps,” she’d added, a little reluctantly.

But the sudden message from Master that day, when the whole exhibition had already been hung, had driven Theodore into a fury. Nor had the arrival of his patron at the gallery to argue his case made matters any better. Quite the contrary.