"What's your programme?" he inquired, disregarding my excellent proposal.
"I shall go up the Bourne," I said. "I want to finish my picture, and the light is just right this morning."
"Well, don't collar the sardines," he replied selfishly. "I should like 'em for supper."
He sauntered off about half-past ten, stopping in the garden to pick our only carnation for his buttonhole.
After some research, I unearthed a tinned tongue, some bread and butter, a cake, and last, but not least, a bottle of claret. These I transplanted tenderly to the punt, and then, putting in my painting materials, pushed off in leisurely fashion up the backwater.
As I passed Otter's Holt, the long, low, creeper-covered bungalow that adjoined our own camping-ground, I caught a glimpse of the girl who had inflamed George's susceptible heart. She was lying in a deck-chair in the verandah, reading a book. By her side crouched a large brindled bulldog, who looked up and emitted a sharp "woof!" as the splash of my punt-pole reached his ears.
His mistress put out a small reproving hand. "Lie down, sir!" she said, in a voice that no decent bulldog could possibly have resisted.
"There are excuses for George," I said to myself as an intervening dump of willow shut out any further observations.
The Bourne, as is usual on weekdays, was delightfully deserted. I pushed my way slowly up its narrow course, thrusting aside the overhanging bushes, and startling an occasional kingfisher into a streak of living blue.
My destination was just round the fourth bend, a place where the sunshine played a bewitching game of hide-and-seek through the branches of an elm. It was this tracery of light and shadow that I was attempting to transfer to my canvas.