"This will probably be hard for you two," she warned them frankly. "If you get tired, don't hesitate to tell me. I'll give you a rest every ten minutes. Val, you sit down in the chair. Slump over toward that arm as if you were about finished. No, more limp than that. Now look straight ahead. You are on the terrace of Beauvallet. Beside you is the girl you love. You are all that stands between her and the black rebels. Now take this sword in your right hand and the pistol in your left. Lean forward a little. There! Now don't move; you've got just the pose I want. Ricky, crouch down by the side of his chair with your arm up so that you can touch his hand. You're terrified. There's death, horrible death, before you!" Val could feel Ricky's hand quiver against his. Charity had made them both see and feel what she wanted them to. They weren't in the peaceful sunlight on the terrace of Pirate's Haven; they were miles farther south in the dark land of Haiti, the Haiti of more than a hundred years ago. Before them was a semitropical forest from which at any moment might crawl--death. Val's hand tightened on the sword hilt; the pistol butt was clammy in his grip. Rupert had put up the easel and laid out the paints. And now, taking up her charcoal, Charity began to sketch with clear, clean strokes. Her models' unaccustomed muscles cramped so that when they shifted during their rest periods they grimaced with pain. Ricky whispered that she did not wonder models were hard to get. After a while Rupert went away without Charity noticing his leaving. The sun burned Val's cheek where the paint had dried and he felt a trickle of moisture edge down his spine. But Charity worked on, thoroughly intent upon what was growing under her brushes. It must have been close to noon when she was at last interrupted. "Hello there, Miss Biglow!" Two men stood below the terrace on a garden path. One of them waved his hat as Charity looked around. And behind them stood Jeems. "Go away," said the worker, "go away, Judson Holmes. I haven't any time for you today." "Not after I've come all the way from New York to see you?" he asked reproachfully. "Why, Charity!" He had the reddest hair Val had ever seen--and the homeliest face--but his small-boy grin was friendliness itself. "Go away," she repeated stubbornly. "Nope!" He shook his head firmly. "I'm staying right here until you forget that for at least a minute." He motioned toward the picture. With a sigh she put down her brush. "I suppose I'll have to humor you." "Miss Charity," Jeems had not taken his eyes from the two models since he had arrived and he did not move them now, "what're they all fixed up like that fur?" "It's a picture for a story," she explained. "A story about Haiti in the old days--"