“Have some hot soup,” said the young man, and both of them laughed.
“It was natural for me to blubber, after all,” said Molly, after Mrs. Brady had taken her departure. “When you sat there so still, with your lips so tightly closed, I felt exactly as I did four years ago, shut out in the cold with all the doors locked; and when you finally spoke it was like coming into your warm pleasant study again with you being kind to me just as you were to the little scared Freshman. Do you know, I like my picture of Aunt Mary, too, and when I thought you didn’t like it I felt forlorn indeed.”
“I notice one thing, Miss Molly Brown of Kentucky doesn’t cry until everything is over. The little Freshman didn’t blubber while she was locked out, but waited until she got into the pleasant study, and now the ancient postgrad is able to restrain her tears until the awful ogre of a critic praises her work. Now let’s have another cup of tea all around and show me what else you have brought.”
“I hesitate to show you this more than the other thing, after your cutting remarks about would-bes. But I want you to read this so you can tell me what this letter means that I got from the editor of a magazine, when he politely returned my rejected poem.”
“Read me the poem yourself. Would you mind? Poetry should always be read aloud, I think; and afterward I will see what I think the editor meant.”
“Read me the poem yourself. Would
you mind?”—Page 218.