Essential Western Novels - Volume 3. Edgar Rice Burroughs

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      XIII

      Art Critics

      It was late the next forenoon when the Little Doctor, feeling the spirit of artistic achievement within her, gathered up brushes and paints for a couple hours' work. Chip, sitting by the window smoking a cigarette, watched her uneasily from the tail of his eye. Looking back to yesterday's “spasm,” as he dubbed it mentally, he was filled with a great and unaccountable shyness. What had seemed so real to him then he feared to-day to face, as trivial and weak.

      He wanted to cry “Stop!” when she laid hand to the curtain, but he looked, instead, out across the coulee to the hills beyond, the blood surging unevenly through his veins. He felt when she drew the cloth aside; she stopped short off in the middle of telling him something Miss Satterly had said—some whimsical thing—and he could hear his heart pounding in the silence which followed. The little, nickel alarm clock tick-tick-ticked with such maddening precision and speed that Chip wanted to shy a book at it, but his eyes never left the rocky bluff opposite, and the clock ticked merrily on.

      One minute—two—the silence was getting unbearable. He could not endure another second. He looked toward her; she stood, one hand full of brushes, gazing, white-faced, at “The Last Stand.” As he looked, a tear rolled down the cheek nearest him and compelled him to speech.

      “What's the matter?” His voice seemed to him rough and brutal, but he did not mean it so.

      The Little Doctor drew a long, quivering breath.

      “Oh, the poor, brave thing!” she said, in a hushed tone. She turned sharply away and sat down.

      “I expect I spoiled your picture, all right—but I told you I'd get into mischief if you went gadding around and left me alone.”

      The Little Doctor stealthily wiped her eyes, hoping to goodness Chip had not seen that they had need of wiping.

      “Why didn't you tell me you could paint like that?” She turned upon him fiercely. “Here you've sat and looked on at me daubing things up—and if I'd known you could do better than—” Looking again at the canvas she forgot to finish. The fascination of it held her.

      “I'm not in the habit of going around the country shouting what I don't know,” said Chip, defensively. “You've taken heaps of lessons, and I never did. I just noticed the color of everything, and—oh, I don't know—it's in me to do those things. I can't help trying to paint and draw.”

      “I suppose old Von Heim would have something to say of your way of doing clouds—but you got the effect, though—better than he did, sometimes. And that cow—I can see her breathe, I tell you! And the wolves—oh, don't sit there and smoke your everlasting cigarettes and look so stoical over it! What are you made of, anyway? Can't you feel proud? Oh, don't you know what you've done? I—I'd like to shake you—so now!”

      “Well, I don't much blame you. I knew I'd no business to meddle. Maybe, if you'll touch it up a little—”

      “I'll not touch a brush to THAT. I—I'm afraid I might kill the cow.” She gave a little, hysterical laugh.

      “Don't you think you're rather excitable—for a doctor?” scoffed Chip, and her chin went up for a minute.

      “I'd like t' kill them wolves,” said Johnny, coming in just then.

      “Turn the thing around, kid, so I can see it,” commanded Chip, suddenly. “I worked at it yesterday till the colors all ran together and I couldn't tell much about it.”

      Johnny turned the easel, and Chip, looking, fell silent. Had HIS hand guided the brush while that scene grew from blank canvas to palpitating reality? Verily, he had “builded better than he knew.” Something in his throat gripped, achingly and dry.

      “Did anybody see it yesterday?” asked the Little Doctor.

      “No—not unless the kid—” “I never said a word about it,” denied Johnny, hastily and vehemently. “I lied like the dickens. I said you had headache an' was tryin' t' sleep it off. I kep' the Countess teeterin' around on her toes all afternoon.” Johnny giggled at the memory of it.

      “Well, I'm going to call them all in and see what they say,” declared she, starting for the door.

      “I don't THINK you will,” began Chip, rebelliously, blushing over his achievement like a girl over her graduation essay. “I don't want to be—”

      “Well, we needn't tell them you did it,” suggested she.

      “Oh, if you're willing to shoulder the blame,” compromised Chip, much relieved. He hated to be fussed over.

      The Little Doctor regarded him attentively a moment, smiled queerly to herself and stood back to get a better view of the painting.

      “I'll shoulder the blame—and maybe claim the glory. It was mine in the first place, you know.” She watched him from under her lashes.

      “Yes, it's yours, all right,” said Chip, readily, but something went out of his face and lodged rather painfully in the deepest corner of his heart. He ignored it proudly and smiled back at her.

      “Do such things really happen, out here?” she asked, hurriedly.