ect of painting pictures. Never, since my arrival in
the bright little country of wide spaces, have I had a keener incentive
to improve the shining hours; but how can a man remember that he's an
artist when the girl he loves has engaged herself to another man, and
one of the few girls he never could love is rapidly engaging herself to
him?

It was in self-defense, not a real desire for work, that I fled to
"Waterspin" and screened myself behind easel and canvas. And then it was
but to find that I had jumped from the frying-pan into the fire.

My move was made while "Mascotte" and her fat companion lay at rest,
that Alb might buy fruit for us from a fruit boat; and Freule Menela
also availed herself of the quiet interval.

"May I come and watch you paint?" she asked, in a tone which showed that
vanity made her sure of a welcome.

I longed for the brutal courage to say that I could never work with an
audience; but I remembered letting slip last night the fact that I
constantly sat sketching on the deck of "Mascotte," during the most
crowded hours of life.

I murmured something, with a smile which needed oiling; and, accepting
the grudging help of my hand, she floated across with an affected little
scream.

"I saw a lovely picture you painted for Miss Rivers," she said, when she
was settled in a camp-stool at my side. "Will you do one for me?"

"With pleasure," I answered. "This one shall be for you. But if you want
it to be good, we mustn't talk. I shall have to concentrate my mind on
my work."

"Thanks for the compliment," she laughed. "I give you leave to forget
me--for a little while."

So I did my best to take her at her word, and tried impressionist
sketches of the charming and ever-changing scene, upon which her
presence was the sole blot; the beautiful old houses set back from the
river on flowery lawns, faded coats-of-arms glowing red and blue and
gold over quaint doorways shaded by splendid trees; fairy villas rising
from billows of pink peonies and green hydrangeas; humble cottages, with
tiny window-panes of twinkling glass, shining out from bowers of late
roses; dove-gray windmills beckoning across piles of golden hay; above,
clouds like flocks of snowy sheep, racing along wide sky-pastures, blue
with the blue of forget-me-nots; below, a crystal flood foaming white
with water-lilies that dipped before the prow of our advancing boat.

Over this crust of pearl, poised always long-stemmed, yellow lilie