for dreams and the
makers of dreams. Over an ocean white with light long breakers rolled
crests gleaming with silver that fell in soft thunder on the beach. Miss
Hastings, hurrying along the board-walk to the village, glanced at them
and looked quickly away.

"Oh, I say!" came a voice out of the darkness behind her, "if you don't
mind, hold on there a minute, will you? Wait for me, please!" The voice
was that of a man, pleasant, but exceedingly determined. Without so much
as turning her head Miss Hastings quickened her steps.

But it was of no use. Whoever her pursuer might be, he was even then at
her side.

"I beg your pardon," breathlessly he began again, "but I've been chasing
you all the way down from the hotel. I want you to come right back there
with me. I have a proposal to make to you."

Even in the darkness he could see how the girl's eyes blazed.

"I never listen--" she began hotly, "to proposals from people I don't
know," she had meant to add, but he gave her no time.

"It will mean the biggest chance for your pictures you've ever had," he
broke in. "Now, listen!"

And, to her complete surprise, Miss Hastings suddenly found herself
doing that very thing.

"There are a lot of things I've got to find out right away," continued
the astonishing stranger, "and the clerk up there tells me you're
painting a series of Indian portraits."

The little art teacher gazed at him fascinated. What manner of man could
this be, she wondered.

"I don't see the connection--" Coldness struggled with curiosity in her
voice.

"Listen!" With uplifted, peremptory hand again he stopped her. Nor is it
safe to say that any book agent, watching the door slowly closing upon
him, ever talked faster, or more rigidly to the point, than did Blair
within the next few minutes.

"Perhaps you won't understand it all right off. I wouldn't expect that.
But it's this way. I'm representing Harper's, and Houghton and Mifflin,
and Dodd and Mead, and--several other firms" (to satisfy his conscience
Blair contended with himself that he might as well as not have been
their representative--a mere oversight on their part ought not to
be allowed to stand in his way), "and I'm out here to find the best
illustrator I can lay hands on to do the pictures for some Indian stuff
I'm getting into shape for one of 'em. I want to see your work. And,
if I like it, I'll pay you well. And anyway, I'll pay every bit of the
expense while you finish your se