it, and with a laugh and the mock gesture of a courtier,
conducted her to the head of his improvised table.
Margaret laughed and returned the bow, stepping
backward with the sweep of a great lady, and settled
herself beside him. In a moment she was on her
knees bending over the brook, her hands in the water,
the tam-o'-shanter beside her. She must wash her
hands, she said--"there was a whole lot of chrome
yellow on her fingers"--and she held them up with a
laugh for Oliver's inspection. Oliver watched her
while she dried and bathed her shapely hands,
smoothed the hair from her temples and tightened
the coil at the back of her head which held all this
flood of gold in check, then he threw himself
down beside her, waiting until she should serve the
feast.

As he told her of his trip up the valley and the
effect it made upon him, and how he had never
dreamed of anything so beautiful, and how good the
Pollards were; and what he had painted and what
he expected to paint; talking all the time with his
thumb circling about as if it was a bit of charcoal and
the air it swept through but a sheet of Whatman's
best, her critical eye roamed over his figure and costume.
She had caught in her first swift, comprehensive
glance from over the bridge-rail, the loose jacket
and broad-brimmed planter's hat, around which, with
his love of color, Oliver had twisted a spray of
nasturtium blossoms and leaves culled from the garden-