Little pots of "non-poisonous" paint stood at her elbow
on the table, together with a box of labels that read, "Made in France."
Her huge clasp-knife was stuck into the under side of the table. She was
now occupied solely with the brushes and the glue pot. She turned the
little figures in her fingers with a wonderful lightness and deftness,
painting the chickens Naples yellow, the elephants blue gray, the horses
Vandyke brown, adding a dot of Chinese white for the eyes and sticking
in the ears and tail with a drop of glue. The animals once done, she put
together and painted the arks, some dozen of them, all windows and no
doors, each one opening only by a lid which was half the roof. She had
all the work she could handle these days, for, from this time till a
week before Christmas, Uncle Oelbermann could take as many "Noah's ark
sets" as she could make.
Suddenly Trina paused in her work, looking expectantly toward the door.
McTeague came in.
"Why, Mac," exclaimed Trina. "It's only three o'clock. What are you home
so early for? Have they discharged you?"
"They've fired me," said McTeague, sitting down on the bed.
"Fired you! What for?"
"I don' know. Said the times were getting hard an' they had to let me
go.
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