“Well,” said Dick as they walked back to camp along the beach, “I suppose you’re feeling pretty stuck-up, Harry, since you’ve had your picture painted by a real artist.”
“And a Floating Artist at that,” added Chub. But Harry shook her head soberly.
“It must be beautiful,” she said softly and wistfully, “to be able to paint pictures like that!”
“That’s so,” agreed Chub vigorously. “I used to think that an artist chap must be a sort of a sissy; I knew one once: I told you about him, remember? I never thought that sitting down and painting pictures of things on pieces of canvas was a decent job for a full-grown man. But I do now, by jove! A chap must have a whole lot of—of goodness, don’t you think, fellows, to do a thing like that picture of Harry?”
“I should think so,” answered Roy. “Painting a thing like that seems to me like composing a wonderful poem or writing a fine piece of music, eh?”
“You bet!” said Chub. “But I’d rather be a painter than a poet any old day.”
“You’re like Harry,” laughed Dick. “She prefers painters to poets, too, nowadays.”
“Harry’s fickle,” said Chub.
But Harry seemed to be in a strangely chastened mood and paid no heed to their insinuations. After dinner they took her across to the Ferry Hill landing in the canoe. A pile of big purple clouds had formed in the west above the distant hills and already the thunder was muttering along the horizon and flashes of lightning were appearing behind the ragged edges of the clouds.
“We’re going to get that sure,” said Dick, who was the weather-wise member of the party. “You’d better hurry back, you fellows.”