United States or Bhutan ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
With all her overaccentuated traits and the metallic quality of technique in the handling of her portrait, Undine Spragg is both a type and an individual she is the newest variation of Daisy Miller and compared with her brazen charmlessness the figures of Hedda Gabler and Mildred Lawson seem melting with tenderness, aglow with subtle charm and muffled exaltation.
Spragg began reproachfully; but Mrs. Heeny, heedless of their bickerings, was pursuing her own train of thought. "What Popple? Claud Walsingham Popple the portrait painter?" "Yes I suppose so. He said he'd like to paint me. Mabel Lipscomb introduced him. I don't care if I never see him again," the girl said, bathed in angry pink. "Do you know him, Mrs. Heeny?" Mrs. Spragg enquired.
"You'd think I'd asked him to buy me the Opera House, the way he's acting over a single box," she muttered, flinging aside her smartly-fitting coat. Mrs. Spragg received the flying garment and smoothed it out on the bed. Neither of the ladies could "bear" to have their maid about when they were at their toilet, and Mrs. Spragg had always performed these ancillary services for Undine.
A man walked past Hal, greeting him in the semi-darkness with a nod and a motion of the hand. It was the Reverend Spragg, the gentleman who was officially commissioned to combat the demon rum in North Valley.
Spragg threw back his head and stared at the garlanded French clock on the chimney-piece. Mrs. Spragg was sitting upstairs in her daughter's bedroom, and the silence of the house seemed to hang about the two men like a listening presence. "Well, I dunno but what I agree with the doctor who said there warn't any diseases, but only sick people. Every case is different, I guess." Mr.
When she returned from her ride Mrs. Spragg received her as if she had come back from the dead. It was absurd, of course; but Undine was inured to the absurdity of parents. "Has father telephoned?" was her first brief question. "No, he hasn't yet." Undine's lips tightened, but she proceeded deliberately with the removal of her habit.
Heeny's grasp, and though she knew the attention would cost her three dollars she was secure in the sense that Abner wouldn't mind. It had been clear to Mrs. Spragg, ever since their rather precipitate departure from Apex City, that Abner was resolved not to mind resolved at any cost to "see through" the New York adventure. It seemed likely now that the cost would be considerable.
In Mabel's world she sought in vain for the originals, and only now and then caught a tantalizing glimpse of one of their familiars: as when Claud Walsingham Popple, engaged on the portrait of a lady whom the Lipscombs described as "the wife of a Steel Magnet," felt it his duty to attend one of his client's teas, where it became Mabel's privilege to make his acquaintance and to name to him her friend Miss Spragg.
Undine asked eagerly; while Mrs. Spragg, impressed, but anxious for facts, pursued: "Does she reside on Fifth Avenue?" "No, she has a little house in Thirty-eighth Street, down beyond Park Avenue." The ladies' faces drooped again, and the masseuse went on promptly: "But they're glad enough to have her in the big houses! Why, yes, I know her," she said, addressing herself to Undine.
"And by God, I will!" Ralph thundered. Anger was the only emotion in him now. He had been fooled, cheated, made a mock of; but the score was not settled yet. He turned back and stood before Mr. Spragg. "I suppose she's gone with Van Degen?" "My daughter's gone alone, sir. I saw her off at the station. I understood she was to join a lady friend."
Word Of The Day