After he had plastered a few more tubes of vermilion over his canvas he
quieted down, and presently gave me an oblique glance over his shoulder.
"Well," he said, "what else are you intending to investigate?"
"Those little animals that live in the crater fires," I said bluntly.
"Yes," he nodded, indifferently, "there are creatures which live
somewhere in the fires of that crater."
"Do you realize what an astounding statement you are making?" I asked.
"It doesn't astound _me_. What do I care whether it astounds you or
anybody else? Nothing interests me except Art."
"But--"
"I tell you nothing interests me except Art!" he yelled. "Don't dispute
it! Don't answer me! Don't irritate me! I don't care whether anything
lives in the fire or not! Let it live there!"
"But have you actually seen live creatures in the flames?"
"Plenty! _Plenty!_ What of it? What about it? Let 'em live there, for all
I care. I've painted pictures of 'em, too. That's all that interests me."
"What do they look like, Mr. Blythe?"
"Look like? _I_ don't know! They look like weasels or rats or bats or
cats or--stop asking me questions! It irritates me! It depresses me!
Don't ask any more! Why don't you go in to lunch? And--tell my daughter
to bring me a bowl of salad out here. _I've_ no time to stuff myself.
Some people have. _I_ haven't. You'd better go in to lunch.... And tell
my daughter to bring me seven tubes of Chinese vermilion with my salad!"
"You don't mean to mix--" I began, then checked myself before his fury.
"I'd rather eat vermilion paint on my salad than sit here talking to
_you_!" he shouted.
I cast a pitying glance at this impossible man, and went into the house.
After all, he was _her_ father. I _had_ to endure him.
* * * * *
After Miss Blythe had carried to her father a large bucket of lettuce
leaves, she returned to the veranda of the bungalow.
[Illustration: "Miss Blythe had carried to her father a large bucket of
lettuce leaves."]
A delightful luncheon awaited us; I seated her, then took the chair
opposite.
A delicious omelette, fresh biscuit, salad, and strawberry preserves, and
a tall tumbler of iced tea imbued me with a sort of mild exhilaration.
Out of the corner of my eye I could see Blythe down in the garden,
munching his lettuce leaves like an ill-tempered rabbit, and daubing away
at his picture while he munched.
"Your father," said I politely, "is something of a genius."
"I am so glad you think so," she said gratefully. "But don't tell him so.
He has been surfeited with praise in Boston. That is why we came out
here."
"Art," said I, "is like science, or tobacco, or tooth-wash. Every man
to his own brand. Personally, I don't care for his kind. But who can say
which is the best kind of anything? Only the consumer. Your father is his
own consumer. He is the best judge of what he likes. And that is the only
true test of art, or anything else."
"How delightfully you reason!" she said. "How logically, how generously!"
"Reason is the handmaid of Science, Miss Blythe."
She seemed to understand me. Her quick intelligence surprised me, because
I myself was not perfectly sure whether I had emitted piffle or an
epigram.
As we ate our strawberry preserves we discussed ways and means of
capturing a specimen of the little fire creatures which, as she
explained, so frequently peeped out at her from the crater fires, and,
at her slightest movement, scurried back again into the flames. Of course
I believed that this was only her imagination. Yet, for years I had
entertained a theory that fire supported certain unknown forms of life.
"I have long believed," said I, "that fire is inhabited by living
organisms which require the elements and temperature of active combustion
for their existence--microörganisms, but not," I added smilingly, "any
higher type of life."
"In the fireplace," she ventured diffidently, "I sometimes see curious
things--dragons and snakes and creatures of grotesque and peculiar
shapes."
I smiled indulgently, charmed by this innocently offered contribution
to science. Then she rose, and I rose and took her hand in mine, and we
wandered over the grass toward the crater, while I explained to her the
difference between what we imagine we see in the glowing coals of a grate
fire and my own theory that fire is the abode of living animalculae.
On the grassy edge of the crater we paused and looked down the slope,
where the circle of steam rose, partly veiling the pale flash of fire
underneath.
"How near can we go?" I inquired.
"Quite near. Come; I'll guide you."
Leading me by the hand, she stepped over the brink and we began to
descend the easy grass slope together.
There was no difficulty about it at all. Down we went, nearer and nearer
to the wall of steam, until at last, when but fifteen feet away from it,
I felt the heat from the flames which sparkled below the wall of vapour.
Here we seated ourselves upon the grass, and I knitted my brows and fixed
my eyes upon this curious phenomenon, striving to discover some reason
for it.
Except for the vapour and the fires, there was nothing whatever volcanic
about this spectacle, or in the surroundings.
From where I sat I could see that the bed of fire which encircled the
crater; and the wall of vapour which crowned the flames, were about three
hundred feet wide. Of course this barrier was absolutely impassable.
There was no way of getting through it into the bottom of the crater.
A slight pressure from Miss Blythe's fingers engaged my attention; I
turned toward her, and she said:
"There is one more thing about which I have not told you. I feel a little
guilty, because _that_ is the real reason I asked you to come here."
"What is it?"
"I think there are emeralds on the floor of that crater."
"Emeralds!"
"I _think_ so." She felt in the ruffled pocket of her apron, drew out a
fragment of mineral, and passed it to me.
I screwed a jeweler's glass into my eye and examined it in astonished
silence. It was an emerald; a fine, large, immensely valuable stone, if
my experience counted for anything. One side of it was thickly coated
with vermilion paint.
"Where did this come from?" I asked in an agitated voice.
"From the floor of the crater. Is it _really_ an emerald?"