Chip, gazing at that tiresome bluff across the coulee, renewed his quarrel with fate.
CHAPTER XV. — The Spoils of Victory.
“I wish, while I'm gone, you'd paint me another picture. Will you, PLEASE?”
When a girl has big, gray eyes that half convince you they are not gray at all, but brown, or blue, at times, and a way of using them that makes a fellow heady, like champagne, and a couple of dimples that will dodge into her cheeks just when a fellow is least prepared to resist them—why, what can a fellow do but knuckle under and say yes, especially when she lets her head tip to one side a little and says “please” like that?
Chip tried not to look at her, but he couldn't help himself very well while she stood directly in front of him. He compromised weakly instead of refusing point-blank, as he told himself he wanted to do.
“I don't know—maybe I can't, again.”
“Maybe you can, though. Here's an eighteen by twenty-four canvas, and here are all the paints I have in the house, and the brushes. I'll expect to see something worth while, when I return.”
“Well, but if I can't—”
“Look here. Straight in the eye, if you please! Now, will you TRY?”