Page:Maud Howe - Atlanta in the South.djvu/45

 and Margaret with a silent bow, and then stood leaning against the door-post, looking at the sculptor with inquiring eyes. Margaret answered the unspoken question with a shake of her head.

"No, I do not need your services as a model to-day, Mr. Feuardent; it is too late to begin to work. Besides, I am very tired of work; if you could take a new rôle, now, and help me to play a little."

"To play?—why, willingly; that is the easiest thing in the world for me. Take off your apron and come; we will go to the fête at the fairgrounds and amuse ourselves with the people. Come, it is a glorious afternoon."

Margaret hastily unfastened and laid aside the long straight blue apron which hid all the pretty curves of her small elastic figure.

"Will they be young and happy and alive?" she asked.

"We will make them so," answered Feuardent, with a ringing laugh. "If you and I cannot stir them up to-day, they must be cold people indeed."

Margaret answered with a full peal of merriment, and danced away to the house, pausing a moment to toss General Jackson in her strong arms.

The two men left together in the studio