At which a chorus of “why nots” issued, to which Polly said forcibly:
“Because it will remind her of what she can never have. Pick out some nice, golden oak and green plush article which will do credit to the establishment of one Oscar Human, plumber at large. It will be salve on a throbbing wound. Daphne will think, bless her amateurish old heart, that it is _our_ choice and being typical of the golden oak and green plush atmosphere which must always be hers, she’ll still feel one of us! But that green metal desk set with silver trim—horrors, think of its shivering with loneliness in Oscar’s back parlor!”
“Right,” Hobart added, “I’ll get the picture of a wistful tabby cat staring at oysters fairly shivering in their shells and a battenberg doily underneath—no, that would be too broad—we’ll get—I say, here’s our infant fresh from Birge’s Corners and Birge’s Corners’ brides—nearly one herself if the truth were known! What ho, Thurley, what would you propose to give a Birge’s Corners’ bride that would meet the town’s approval?”
Flushing as she thought of Lorraine’s chest of linens, the new house which was to cost twenty thousand dollars—and then of Ernestine’s necklace which cost that alone—Thurley, without hesitation, answered, “Why, a cut glass punch bowl with the silver hooks all around it for the little glasses!”
“The infant is christened,” Hobart pronounced after the applause ended. “I nominate a shopping committee of Ernestine Christian and Thurley Precore.”
During the rest of the supper party Thurley remained a spectator until Hobart whispered that she sing for them and she rose, for the first time in her life, reluctant to obey.
“She has not done well,” she heard Hobart saying as she finished, “stage fright—too few of us—too small a room—the opera stage, five thousand people and she would sing as if her throat were copper lined—however—”
Polly Harris finished the sentence for him. “However, if Ernestine wisely realizes the limitations of the pianoforte, Thurley Precore will never have to realize the limitations of her voice.”
Caleb took Ernestine and Thurley home in his machine, Collin and Polly following in the former’s roadster. Being the infant, Thurley was left at her hotel first of all with fond good nights and quips about the sandman’s speedy arrival! She regretted that she was not allowed to whirl about taking Polly home and then Collin and then Ernestine and, finally, to be left alone with this rich, willful novelist-slacker and have him tell about his world even as Ernestine had hinted of hers.