Page:Keeping the Peace.pdf/216

 whole of September and the half of October resembled that brief American season which is called Indian summer. It was a warm, hazy, soft, golden time that smelled of pears ripening against walls.

Edward lingered in the Beaulieus' house and painted the autumn. What he should do when he had finished painting out of doors with Beaulieu he did not know. Some of the wise old painters who came to see Beaulieu said one thing and some said another.

There came a friendly letter from Townley. With the letter came a short story by a new writer named Heller and an offer of fifty dollars apiece for three illustrations. The story was about a wasp, and models for the illustrations were always to be found between the hours of sunrise and sunset, among the ripening pears on the south end of the Beaulieu house.

In three days the illustrations were finished and on their way to New York. Even Edward felt that the wasp hero was sufficiently comical and sinister. He was pleased with himself and hoped that Townley would send him some more commissions. He did not wish to be an illustrator, but to a boy earning between forty and fifty dollars a month a hundred and fifty dollars all in a lump, with the possibility of more such lumps in the not too distant future, was rather thrilling.