He moved under the awning, thanking her with a smile; and the people,
laughing, shuffled unwillingly aside and let him paint on in peace. It
was only little Bébée, but they had spoilt the child from her infancy,
and were used to obey her.

The painter took a long time. He set about it with the bold ease of one
used to all the intricacies of form and color, and he had the skill of a
master. But he spent more than half the time looking idly at the humors
of the populace or watching how the treasures of Bébée's garden
went away one by one in the hands of strangers.

Meanwhile, ever and again, sitting on the edge of her stall, with
his colors and brushes tossed out on the board, he talked to her, and,
with the soft imperceptible skill of long practice in those arts, he drew
out the details of her little simple life.

There were not always people to buy, and whilst she rested and sheltered
the flowers from the sun, she answered him willingly, and in one of her
longer rests showed him the wonderful stockings.

"Do you think it _could_ be the fairies?" she asked him a little
doubtfully.

It was easy to make her believe any fantastical nonsense; but her fairies
were ethereal divinities. She could scarcely believe that they had laid
that box on her chair.

"Impossible to doubt it!" he replied, unhesitatingly. "Given a belief in
fairies at all, why should there be any limit to what they can do? It is