hing
Strawberry, I suppose, or Jumping Turtle?"

"No!" she answered. "I have a very pretty name in Sioux. They call me
the Sage Hen, because I am so quiet. I like it much better than my own
name."

Strong was beaten at this game. She capped all his questions for him
with an air of such good faith as made him helpless. Whether it were
real or assumed, he could not make up his mind. He took a great fancy to
the Sage Hen, while she in her turn took a violent liking for Esther, as
the extremest contrast to herself. When Esther realized that this
product of Colorado was likely to be on her hands for several hours
every day, she felt less amused than either Strong or Mr. Murray, for
Miss Brooke's conversation, though entertaining as far as it went, had
not the charm of variety. It was not long before her visits to Esther's
studio became so frequent and so exhausting that Esther became desperate
and felt that some relief must at any cost be found. The poor little
prairie flower found New York at first exciting; she felt shy and
awkward among the swarms of strange people to whose houses Mrs. Murray
soon began to take her by way of breaking her in at once to the manners
of New York society; and whenever she could escape, she fled to Esther
and her quiet studio, with the feelings of a bird to its nest. The only
drawback to her pleasure there was that she had nothing to do; her
reading seemed to have been entirely in books of a severely moral caste,
and in consequence she could not be induced to open so much as a
magazine. She preferred to chatter about herself and the people she met.
Before a week had passed Esther felt that something must be done to
lighten this burden, and it was then that, as we shall see, Mr. Hazard
suggested her using Catherine for a model. The idea might not have been
so easily accepted under other circumstances, but it seemed for the
moment a brilliant one.

As Wharton had said of Esther, she was but a second-rate amateur.
Whether there was a living artist whom Wharton would have classed higher
than a first-rate amateur is doubtful. On his scale to be second-rate
was a fair showing. Esther had studied under good masters both abroad
and at home. She had not the patience to be thorough, but who had? She
asked this question of Mr. Wharton when he attacked her for bad drawing,
and Wharton's answer left on her mind the impression that he was himself
the only thorough artist in the world; yet others with whom