“I never said that anything else was safe now, did I?” inquired Polly. “But you won’t make your parties a success if you go on the lines I indicated as safe. After all, what is life without risks?—especially in conversation.”
“But I don’t believe I could be interesting anyhow,” said Mrs. Spicer with a forlorn sigh. “I never can think of anything to say.”
“Then don’t say anything,” Polly advised, “and your silence will become so rich and meaty with thought (for every one, even a canary, thinks, there can be no doubt about that), that after a time, when you have quite lost the habit of thinking what to say, a moment may come when some slight emotion will unloose your tongue and it will speak for itself, and——”
“Polly, dear,” I warned her, “you will be so sorry when you have drawn the analogy between what Mrs. Spicer will say and Balaam’s ass; it will be easier to stop now than to explain it away.”
Mrs. Spicer giggled. We know her pretty well now, and she doesn’t mind.
“I wish, Martha, that you would rely a little more on my judgment and less on my knowledge of Scripture,” said Polly. “I had quite forgotten the story you refer to. What was in my mind was a vision of what it would be like if the things we call ‘still life’ suddenly spoke and told us how the world looked to them. It would be a delightful change from hearing how it looks to clever men. As it is, we have no missing link between the unusual sincerity of some of us and the usual insincerity of the rest. What we want is the truth—the whole truth—about what people with faces like turbot and macaroons think. I should stay awake all night with the excitement of knowing Mrs. Beehive as her Maker knows her. Probably she could throw a great deal of light on all sorts of obvious things that complicated people, like Reginald, miss owing to being tangled up in their own intelligence.”
“By the way,” said Mrs. Spicer, “talking of food, isn’t it absurd how we keep on with the same dishes when the cookery books are full of different ways of cooking everything? But, somehow, if you look through the books, there are only about three things one can have, because the others either want ingredients that we haven’t got in the house, and that are not worth buying for once, or they have to be prepared the day before, or they use too many separate pans, and cook grumbles about the washing-up; but it does seem unenterprising, as you say.”
“Considering, my dear, that since the time of Noah, or thereabouts, we have been going on as usual and found it less trouble, it is not likely”—said Polly sententiously—“it is not likely, so far as I can judge by the look of you, that you will return our calls by moonlight, or go to church on a week-day, or tell me which of us you would rather ran away with Mr. Spicer——”
“But you don’t do those sort of things yourself,” protested Mrs. Spicer.
Polly said, “Excuse me a moment,” and went to answer the telephone.