ght, naked. My gaze grew fat with pleasure as it
fed on her nakedness....

She stepped down to the water's edge, dabbling her outstretched toes in
the flow.

Ankle-deep, she stood and stooped. She scooped up water and dashed it
over her breasts. She rose erect a moment and gazed idly about.

Then, binding her hair in a careful knot, she went in with a plunge and
I saw that she could swim well.

My heart shook and thundered so that its pulse pervaded all my body with
its violence. I held in curb a mad, almost irresistible impulse to rush
in after her, crying out that I was a poet ... that this was the true
romance ... that we must throw aside the conventions ... that no one
would ever know.

Then I thought of my skinniness and ugliness in comparison with her
slight but perfect beauty. And I knew that it would repel her. And I
held still in utter shame, not being good-looking enough to join her in
the river.

I lay prone, almost fainting, dizzy, not having the strength to creep
away, as I now considered I must do.

I saw her return and watched her as she slowly resumed her clothes,
piece by leisurely piece. She folded her camp stool, packed her small
easel in a case and started off toward town.

Shouldn't I now intercept her, explain who I was, and offer to escort
her along the tracks back to town? For it was surely dangerous for her
to come so far into the night, alone. There were tramps ... and the
stray criminal negro from the Bottoms ... God knows what else, in her
path!

But my timidity let her pass on alone.

I needed the coolness of the water about me, as I swam out to my tent. I
forgot my clothes on my head and they soused in the water as I swam. All
night I tossed, sleepless. I lay delirious with remembrance of her ...
imagined myself with her as I lay there, and whispered terms of love and
endearment into the dark.

Who was she? One thing I knew--she must be a student, and an art
student under Professor Grant in the Fine Arts Department.

This was the incident that decided me to enroll again as regular
student, and to fold my tent, leave my solitary island, and return to
town ... where I sought out Frank Randall, and he again offered me the
room I had given up. And he gave me work as his bookkeeper, several
hours of the day ... which work I undertook to perform in return for my
room. In addition he gave me two dollars a week extra.

* * * * *

One afternoon soon