Page:O Genteel Lady! (1926).pdf/81

 Miss Bigley 'put her whole heart,' as she said, in her uplifting articles, but also wrote poems. Among the titles were 'Wilt Thou Love Me When I'm Old,' 'The Maniac,' 'The Last Night at Home.' She wrote poetry only when there was a space to fill and no free contribution lying about her desk. This was also her attitude towards stories. They all pointed a moral, and Mr. Fox himself assured Lanice that Miss Bigley had a genius for this particular type of 'literary butter.' Lanice found that she, too, could write poems and stories of any length, at any time, and on any known subject. She learned the mechanical trick of starting in the middle of a scene.

Look here, Emma, isn't this the sweetest little pencil you ever saw?" said a young and beautiful girl to a companion as she danced lightly in at the open door one pleasant summer afternoon, holding the object of her remark at the same time before her friend's admiring gaze.' That was the way you did it!

She learned, from Miss Bigley, new elegancies of speech and was highly commended when she said the heart of the beautiful heroine was known to be as 'lovely as its earthly casket.'

Mr. Fox snorted over this and called up his myrmidons to admire, much as he had forced their attention to the 'Bosom Friend' or 'Sontag.' He repeated it with relish to Captain Poggy. 'You can't imagine what a monkey-see-monkey-do-of-a-girl your ex-amanuensis is. Why, she bigleys about like an old hand. Frankly she has a genius for writing the most unmitigated rot.'