So Polly roused out of her dejection and set to work, and presently the hay-makers, and the Marken boys and girls, the funny little houses that looked as if they dropped down pellmell from the clouds and settled where they had dropped—the high ridges along which the men and boys, walking in their full baggy trousers, looked as if they were blown up, and formed a Dutch perspective perfectly awful—all these queer, delightful things were presently imprisoned in the two kodaks.
Jasper looked up. "There, that's my last picture," he declared. "At any rate, for now."
"Oh, one more! I must get a good picture of those girls raking hay." Polly ran off a few steps and sat down on a log to focus. The Marken girls happened to look up, and immediately whirled around and presented their backs to her.
"Oh, dear, how hateful!" she exclaimed; "that would have been a splendid picture."
"Never mind," said Jasper; "you can catch them unawares, and have another try at them."
"Not so good as that," said Polly, sorrowfully. "Well, it can't be helped." So she was just going to get up from her log, when the girls, thinking from her attitude that she had given up the idea of taking a picture of them, turned back to their work. As quick as a flash Polly focussed again, and was just touching the button, when a hand came in front of her kodak, and she saw the grinning face of a Marken girl under its pot-hook of hair and with the long, dangling curl on one side, close to her own.
"Too late!" exclaimed Polly. "And don't you ever do that again." And the hand was withdrawn, and the girl clattered off as fast as she could run in her wooden shoes.
"I got them," said Polly, running back in triumph to Jasper.
"Yes, and I took a picture of the saucy girl while she was trying to stop yours," said Jasper. "So she didn't do much harm, after all. Oh, here is a splendid group! See them standing by that old tumble-down house, Polly," he added excitedly.
"I thought you had taken your last picture, Jasper," said Polly, bursting into a laugh.