Emmy Lou with heightened color, resolute face, and blue bows, arrived at home. She went straight to Papa just returned from Uncle Charlie's office and strumming on the piano.
"You're a Presbyterian," she said.
"It sounds like an indictment," said Uncle Charlie. "But he will have to own up. Admit your guilt, Alec. How did you find it out?"
"Presbyterians play and sing 'Selections From the Operas' on Sunday, and so does he."
"You look ruffled, Alec," from Uncle Charlie, "But so does someone else. Your cheeks are hot," to Emmy Lou. "Something else is disturbing; out with it."
"The girl named Lorelei Ritter who laughed at me Friday in class was at church and spoke to me coming out."
"What did she say?"
"She said did I know it was her father who played the concomitant to the soprano's song?"
"Invite her round, and urge her to be friendly," begged Uncle Charlie when he stopped shouting. "We need her badly. Besides I'm sure I'd like to know her."
Aunt Cordelia came downstairs that night after seeing Emmy Lou to bed. "Whatever is to be done with the child? Has she talked to you, Alec? She says she can't be confirmed because she is going to be a Presbyterian. And then she cried bitterly. They stand up to pray and sit down to sing, she told me desperately. That if it was right—which it wasn't, of course,—she'd wish people didn't have to be Episcopalians or Bohemians or Presbyterians, but just Christians. I told her I thought we would drop the question of confirmation until next year."