II
With her silver tongs she selected a sweetmeat. When it had melted in her sweeter mouth, she lighted a cigarette, saluted us with a gay little gesture and smilingly began:
"Don't ask me how I know what these people said; that is my concern, not yours. Don't ask me how I know what unspoken thoughts animated these people; that is my affair. Nor how I seem to be perfectly acquainted with their past histories; for that is part of my profession."
"And still the wonder grew," commented the novelist tritely, "that one small head could carry all she knew!"
"Why," asked Stafford, "do you refuse to reveal your secret? Do you no longer trust us, Athalie?"[10]
She answered: "Comment prétendons-nous qu'un autre garde notre secret, si nous n'avons pas pu le garder nous-même?"
Nobody replied.
"Now," she said, laughingly, "I will tell you all that I know about the Orange Puppy."
Plans for her first debut began before her birth. When it became reasonably certain that she was destined to decorate the earth, she was entered on the waiting lists of two schools—The Dinglenook School for Boys, and The Idlebrook Institute for Young Ladies—her parents taking no chances, but playing both ends coming and going.