Thurley finished the confession. “Then they all met and loved you in different ways.”
“Bliss as a comrade and Collin as a big sister and Caleb as a real man loves a real woman.”
“You’ve grown up, Thurley,” was Ernestine’s comment. “But I must tell you that little Polly was added quite unexpectedly. She was posing as a sprite for Collin; you know Collin does children’s portraits with pastel backgrounds of favorite fairy tales, half indistinct—very good idea and quite the rage. Polly is an ideal sprite, brownie or gnome model and Collin had run across her by accident. The first morning she posed she fainted dead away—slam bang—on the floor, and it was a real faint because she hadn’t had a square meal in two days, just samples of cereals and Hudson River elixir. They discovered her fierce pride and her tragic ambition and her adorable self, so she has been our Polly ever since—”
“Loving Collin, woman of the world,” repeated Ernestine. “Then Polly blew in one night in her audacious fashion accompanied by Mark Wirth. Now we had seen Mark dance and enjoyed him but knew him to be a will o’ the wisp person and Lissa Dagmar, who I hope stays in Paris for all time, had bewitched him and we really don’t approve of that kind of thing. Mark, however, was like the foundling in a basket, crying feebly during the stormy night, and we just could not turn him away although Lissa tried her best to make inroads into our ‘family.’ She cried and bribed and writhed because she still remained aloof from the charmed circle. And we kept Mark and made him one of us, scolding him roundly every chance we had.”
“And now I am the infant,” said Thurley slowly, “but why don’t you like Madame Dagmar?” recalling the purring voice she had once heard.
“She is impossible—a large person dressed fantastically in sort of medieval patterns; she has Titian hair and serpent green eyes, those heavy, white lids in which purplish veins spread in profusion, and a wretched voice with the unexplained phenomenon of being able to reach a tiptop note far above the range of any other soprano in the world. This one note is as soft and clear as if it were heaven-sent. It has made her a name and a fortune, the one divine sound coming as a reward for poor technique and wobbly trills. She tried opera, failed miserably, and does concert tours where people crowd to see her gowns and wait for that tree-top call. The rest of the time she gives singing lessons. We call her the ‘Voice Assassin,’ and Bliss Hobart threatens to appeal to the authorities if she does not take down her shingle. Ten dollars for twenty minutes and nothing of value to the pupil save seeing and hearing what is wisest to avoid! However, like many impossible persons, she has a following, a personality—a—a—way with her. She will pet and coo over you, if Mark does not, and you had best be outwardly polite; it is wisest thus, paying no heed to her since Lissa proceeds on the principle of ‘what he thought he might require, he went and took the same as me.’ To Lissa playfulness always means experience, although the other fellow may not know it! And then—”