It is his taste,
not mine--but I knew that you would understand."
"But," Miss Emily gasped, "did he make them?"
"Most certainly. With his clever old fingers--and he will make as many
more as you wish."
Thus came white elephants back to Miss Emily's shelves. "It seems
almost too good to be true," she said, sniffing the violets and smiling
at him.
"Nothing is too good to be true," he told her, "and now I have
something to ask. That you will come and see my father."
"With pleasure."
He glanced around the empty shop. "Why not now? There are no
customers--and the gray light makes things dreary--. And it is spring
in my hothouses--there are a thousand cyclamens for the one you have
lost, a thousand violets for every one on the backs of these little
elephants--narcissus and daffodils--. Why not?"
Why not, indeed? Why not, when Adventure beckoned, go to meet it? She
had tied herself for so many years to the commonplace and the practical.
And so Miss Emily closed her shop, and went in Ulrich's car, leaving a
card tucked in the shop door, "Will reopen at three."
It was at one o'clock that Dr.
Pages:
269
270
271
272
273
274
275
276
277
278
279
280
281
282
283
284
285
286
287
288
289
290
291
292
293