But in this matter of the new sign-board he took the deepest interest. He had a design of his own for it, which he was most anxious the painter should adopt. “Look ’ee, Master Linseed,” said he. “It be the Heart of Oak. Now I know a oak-tree with a big trunk and two arms. They stretches out one on each side, and the little branches closes in above till ’tis just like a heart. ’Twould be beautiful, Master Linseed, and I could bring ’ee leaves of the oak so that ’ee could match the yellows and greens. And then there’d be trees beyond and beyond, smaller and smaller, and all like a blue mist between them, thee know. That blue in the paper ’ee’ve got would just do, and with more white to it ’twould be beautiful for the sky. And”—
“And who’s to do all that for a few shillings?” broke in the painter, testily. “And Master Chuter wants it done and hung up for the Foresters’ dinner.”
Since the pressing nature of the commission was Master Linseed’s excuse for not adopting his idea for the sign, it seemed strange to Jan that he did not set about it in some fashion. But he delayed and delayed, till Master Chuter was goaded to repeat the old rumor that real sign-painting was beyond his powers.
It was within a week of the dinner that the little innkeeper burst indignantly into the painter’s shop. Master Linseed was ill in bed, and the sign-board lay untouched in a corner.
“It be a kind of fever that’s on him,” said his wife.
“It be a kind of fiddlestick!” said the enraged Master Chuter; and turning round his eye fell on Jan, who was looking as disconsolate as himself. Day after day had he come in hopes of seeing Master Linseed at work, and now it seemed indefinitely postponed. But the innkeeper’s face brightened, and, seizing Jan by the shoulder, he dragged him from the shop.
“Look ’ee here, Jan Lake,” said he. “Do ’ee thenk _thee_ could paint the sign? I dunno what I’d give ’ee if ’ee could, if ’twere only to spite that humbugging old hudmedud yonder.”
Jan felt as if his brain were on fire. “If ’ee’ll get me the things, Master Chuter,” he gasped, “and’ll let me paint it in your place, I’ll do it for ’ee for nothin’.”
The innkeeper was not insensible to this consideration, but his chief wish was to spite Master Linseed. He lost no time in making ready, and for the rest of the week Jan lived between the tallet (or hay-loft) of the inn and the wood where he had first studied trees. Master Chuter provided him with sheets of thick whitey-brown paper, on which he made water-color studies, from which he painted afterwards. By his desire no one was admitted to the tallet, though Master Chuter’s delight increased with the progress of the picture till the secret was agony to him. Towards the end of the week they were disturbed by a scuffling on the tallet stairs, and Rufus bounced in, followed at a slower pace by the schoolmaster, crying, “Unearthed at last!”