“But when it comes to paint and paper and plumbing, the house isn’t worth it, and I can’t agree to do it,” he declared positively.  “Not for any one year rental.”

“I don’t want paint, paper, or plumbing,” she replied, and he set her down as eccentric indeed.  “But I do want that fireplace unsealed, and if you will put that and the chimney in order, so I can have fires there, I won’t ask for any modern conveniences.  When can you have it ready for me?  By the middle of July?”

He did not think this possible, but his new tenant convinced him that it was, and went away smiling, her hands full of June roses, and her spirits high.  It was with her vivid personality at its best that she presently took her place at the luncheon table, meeting there, however, at first, only Miss Mathewson.

“My patient has fallen asleep after his walk,” Amy explained to Mrs. Burns, as she came in.  “I thought he had better not be wakened.”

“You were quite right, I am sure,” Ellen agreed.  Then she made the two young women known to each other, and the three sat down.  R.P.  Burns, M.D., rushing in the midst of the meal, found them laughing merrily together over a tale the guest had been telling.

As Burns came forward Miss Ruston rose to meet him.  The two regarded each other with undisguised interest as they shook hands.

“Yes, I can make a much better photograph of you than the one on your wife’s dressing-table,” said she, judicially, and laughed at his astonished expression.

“Can you, indeed?” he inquired.  “Have you a snapshot camera concealed anywhere about you?  If so, I’ll consider going back to town for my luncheon.”

“You are safe for to-day,” Ellen assured him, and he sat down.

He was told the tale of the morning, the subject introduced by his wife, and amplified by their guest.  He expressed his interest.

“You have a good courage, Miss Ruston,” said he.  “And we’ll agree to stand by you.  Any time, in the middle of the night, that we hear the crash and fall of decayed old timbers, we’ll come to the rescue and pull you out.  We don’t have much excitement here.  The wreck will have the advantage of advertising you thoroughly.  Then you can build a tight little bungalow on the spot and settle down to real business.”

Miss Ruston shook her shapely head.  “No tight little bungalows for me,” she averred.  “Those vine-clad old walls will make wonderful backgrounds for my outdoor subjects—­they and the garden.  Then, indoors—­the fireplace, the queer old doors—­”

Red Pepper looked at his wife.  “Has the village a passion for quaintness?” he asked her.  “Will our leading citizens want to be photographed in their old hoopskirts, with roses behind their ears?”

“Oh, you don’t understand!” cried Miss Ruston.  “Ellen—­will you excuse me while I run up and bring down an example or two of my work?”

She was back in a minute, several prints in her hand.  She came around behind Burns’s chair and laid one before him, another before Amy Mathewson.  Ellen, who had already seen the prints, watched her husband’s face as he examined the photograph.