CHAPTER VIII
SKAGEN
To Valdemar it seemed like a week, rather than just three days, since he had bidden good-bye to his mother, Karen and Aunt Amalia, and brought Karl with him up to the little painter's village of Skagen on the Kattegat, where they were to spend the months of July and August visiting Uncle Thor, who had built for himself one of the most charming of all the pretty, long, low, vine-covered homes of the famous Artist-Colony, of which he, as Court Painter, was by far the most distinguished member.
Up here was Uncle Thor's summer studio, with its row of fifteen great windows between which glorious red hollyhocks towered almost up to the red roof-tiles. On the south, the windows overlooked a gay, flower-massed garden where, on warm summer afternoons, the great sculptor loved to chat with painter-friends, and serve tea under his wind-swept old elms.
Here, in this bare and lofty studio, with its half-finished paintings and groups in clay, and, if the day be chilly, its crackling wood hearth-fire at the further end, throwing a flickering, rosy light over all,—here Valdemar was to spend many hard, long hours every day under his gifted godfather's instruction.
"In the centre of the studio stood the unfinished statue of the little Crown Prince"
"In the whole of Denmark was there ever any boy half so fortunate?" thought Valdemar to himself, as he made a mental resolution to show Uncle Thor his appreciation by the hardest work of his life. Valdemar could work hard, and he meant not only to prove to his uncle what earnest toil and definite purpose could do, but also to win his offer to send him to the Academy in the fall.
On a low platform, in the centre of the studio, stood the unfinished statue of the little Crown Prince Olaf of Norway which Uncle Thor had commenced in Copenhagen at the Royal Palace. Day by day it was nearing completion.
"And here," said Valdemar's great teacher, uncovering a smaller but similar clay figure of the same charming subject, "is work my ambitious little pupil is to finish before he leaves Skagen. It will be hard work, Valdemar, and it will put your ability as a young sculptor to a fine test. But you can do it, Valdemar, and do it creditably, too!"
"Oh, Uncle Thor! Do you really think so? I'll try hard enough!" promised the lad as he set to work in good earnest.