"But you are quite sure of swimming?" said Fräulein Vogel, taking up the
picture again and looking at it closely.

"It is very bad," Kitty said.

"Abominable," said the painter. She drew a long breath and shook her head.
"Abominable," she repeated, almost as though such an abominable piece of
work demanded respect. "_Ach_! You leave old Zweifarbe's studio," she
exclaimed. "Send your easel over to me. You want to make some money? Good.
There are many artists here in DÃ¥sseldorf who say I cannot paint; there is
not one who will say I have not made money. Perhaps I can teach you." And
Fräulein Vogel burst out laughing, while Kitty stared at her in blank
surprise.

"But you have never taken pupils," she stammered.

"I have never died; but I suppose I shall," was the response.

And so old Zweifarbe lost a pupil,--for Kitty's easel was straightway
borne on the back of a sturdy _dienstmann_ to Fräulein Vogel's studio.
What a chatter, what a commotion, it caused in the nest of painters! They
chirped and gossiped and pecked each other like a flock of sparrows. The
Frau Pastorin expressed the popular sentiment when she discussed Hedwig
Vogel's eccentricities.

"How much a lesson?" she said, half closing one shrewd gray eye. "How much
a lesson? Ah, she would not take pupils,--no, no, not while she was Hedwig
Vogel; and _der liebe Gott_ knows she will never be Hedwig anything else.
But she will make an exception for our deer Mees Varing; oh, yes, an
exception! Wait till Mees Varing's rich American friends come along and