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“I guess so,” he replied casually. “Dollar in my coat, I think.”

Smith’s eyes glittered. “Lend it to me. I'll pay it back before night. All the rest I owe you, too. How much do I owe you, anyhow?”

“Can’t remember,” Frank answered, and sang again.

“I'll have lots of money before the day’s out,” Smith continued, a note of excitement in his voice.

Frank sang softly. A queer thing to get excited about, money, when the sky was so blue, the water so warm, and there was such a deep satisfaction just in lying on the white beach and humming a song.

“In your coat, you say?” Smith persisted.

Frank nodded. “Go and get it. The locker door’s open.”

Smith went at once. When he returned he held a dollar bill in one hand, and in the other a small canvas.

“I’m taking that picture I left with you, Frank,” he explained. “Something tells me there’s a market for my work at last.” He stared at the painting critically. A dark-skinned, black-eyed girl stood against a background of cool green. She held a crimson flower between her lips, and she had the look of the tropics, of lazy islands lost in southern seas. “You know,” the beach-comber added with almost reluctant admiration, “that’s not half bad.”

“Yeah,” said Frank.

“Not bad at all,” Smith continued. “But then, they told me I had talent, Frank. I heard it in New York—and in Paris too. Talent—maybe a touch of genius—but not much else. No backbone—no character—nothing to back it up. You’ve got to have character, my boy.”