A woman is reclining on a chaise longue while a man hunches over his desk. He is writing out ‘a little cheque’ for his friend. The pair are evidently more involved than their aloof positions suggest. The setting is Sickert’s studio at 24 Red Lion Square and his models were the painters Dora Sly (née Erichsen) and Charles Ginner. An impression of the small plate is inscribed ‘Red Lion Sq./Mrs Sly & Ginner’. Wendy Baron established that Erichsen and Ginner were probably romantically involved before she married ‘the intriguing and exciting’ Alfred Victor Sly. She further surmised that A Little Cheque was ‘Sickert’s comment on the economics of their relationship’: ‘Dora rejected Ginner in favour of Sly, but accepted financial help from her former suitor.’ The large plate of A Little Cheque likely preceded the more detailed and resolved small plate, which was published by the Carfax Gallery in 1915.