could see her at work. He thought it wonderful to be able thus to make a
beautiful picture out of such a commonplace thing as a saleratus swamp.
But then, he was beginning to think that this girl was capable of
endless wonders. He had met no other girl just like her, so young and so
beautiful, and yet so talented and so well-informed; so rich, and yet
so simple in manner of her life; so high born and bred, and yet so
companionable with those of humbler station.

The painter squeezed a daub of brilliant red on to her palette. She
gazed for a moment at the western sky, then turning to Dorian, she
asked:

"Do you think I dare put a little more red in my picture?"

"Dare?" he repeated.

The young man followed the pointing finger of the girl into the flaming
depths of the sky, then came and leaned carefully over the painting.

"Tell me which is redder, the real or the picture?" she asked.

Dorian looked critically back and forth. "The sky is redder," be
decided.

"And yet if I make my picture as red as the sky naturally is, many
people would say that it is too red to be true. I'll risk it anyway."
Then she carefully laid on a little more color.

"Nature itself, our teacher told us, is always more intense than any
representation of nature."