She desisted by and by long enough to go and ask a question of Aunt Cordelia.
"If I were to be confirmed at St. Simeon's could I practice my selections on Sunday?"
"Practice them on Sunday?" Aunt Cordelia had enough trouble getting her to practice on week-days to be outdone with the question. "Why do you ask such a thing? You know you could not."
That night Emmy Lou asked Papa a question a little falteringly: "Are you a Bohemian?"
"Instead, the veriest drudge you ever knew," he said. "There's too much on me, making a living for us both, to be so glorious a thing."
She went around to ask a question of Sadie the next morning. She had been to Sadie's church often enough to know that she liked to go. The prayers were long but the singing was frequent and hearty. No one need mark the time at Sadie's church, the singing marking its own time warmly and strongly until it seemed to swing and sway, and Sadie sang and Emmy Lou sang and everybody sang, and Emmy Lou for one wasn't sure she did not swing and sway too, and her heart was buoyant and warm. She loved the songs at Sadie's church; what matter if she did not know what they meant?
"Oh, there's honey in the Rock, my brother, There's honey in the Rock for you, Leave your sins for the blood to cover, There is honey in the Rock for you, for you."
She could wish that Papa might be a Methodist. It hardly was likely, all things considered, but one could make sure.
"Would 'Selections From the Operas' be allowed by your church on Sunday?" she asked Sadie.
Sadie not only was horrified but, like Aunt Cordelia, was outdone. "Why, Emily Louise McLaurin, you know they would not be!" she said indignantly.
Emmy Lou had no such desire for Papa to be a Presbyterian. She had been with Hattie often enough to know that the emphasis is all on the sermon there. Hattie knew her feeling and when inviting her to go put the emphasis on the voluntary of which she was proud.
This very Saturday afternoon she came around full of information and enthusiasm. "Our soprano has done so well with her new teacher, he is going to play our organ tomorrow by request and she is going to sing a solo during the collection. I want you to come from Sunday school and go."
She had other news. "I asked Lorelei Ritter yesterday after school if she was a Bohemian and she got mad. She said no, she wasn't, she was a Bavarian."