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But Sacred Name of a Little Good Man! (as the depraved French
people say), what is the use of this continuous osculation
between rational beings of opposite sexes who set out to enjoy
themselves? If only St. Paul, in the famous passage when he says
there is a time for this and a time for that, had mentioned
kissing, he would have done a great deal of practical good.
July 13th.
Tonight, for the first time since I came into the family estates
(such as they are), I feel the paralysis of aspiration occasioned
by poverty. If I were very rich, I would buy the two next
houses, pull them down and erect on the site a tower forty foot
high. At the very top would be one comfortable room to be
reached by a lift, and in this room I could have my being, while
it listed me, and be secure from all kinds of incursions and
interruptions. Antoinette's oneeyed cat could not scratch for
admittance; Antoinette herself could not enter under pretext of
domestic economics and lure me into profitless gossip; and I
could defy Carlotta, who is growing to be as pervasive as the
smell of pickles over Crosse & Blackwell's factory. She comes in
without knocking, looks at picturebooks, sprawls about doing
nothing, smokes my best cigarettes, hums tunes which she has
picked up from barrelorgans, bends over me to see what I am
writing, munching her eternal sweetmeats in my ear, and laughs at
me when I tell her she has irremediably broken the thread of my
ideas. Of course I might be brutal and turn her out. But
somehow I forget to do so, until I realisetoo latethe havoc
she has made with my work.
I did, however, think, when Miss Griggs mounted guard over
Carlotta, and Antoinette and her cat were busied with luncheon
cookpans, that my solitude was unimperilled. I see now there is
nothing for it but the tower. And I cannot build the tower; so I
am to be henceforward at the mercy of anything feline or feminine
that cares to swish its tail or its skirts about my drawingroom.
I was arranging my notes, I had an illuminating inspiration
concerning the life of Francois Villon and the contemporary court
of Cosmo de' Medici; I was preparing to fix it in writing when
the door opened and Stenson announced:
Mrs. Ordeyne and Miss Ordeyne.
My Aunt Jessica and Dora came in and my inspiration went out. It
hasn't come back yet.
My aunt's apologies and Dora's draperies filled the room. I must
forgive the invasion. They knew they were disturbing my work.

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