Page:The Strange Case of Miss Annie Spragg (1928).djvu/43

 the calcomine of the religions through which Mrs. Weatherby must have dragged her by the hair of her head. And then suddenly he experienced excitement at the sight of her soft full throat and the rather matronly curve of the bosom beneath the shining black poplin. He began to see her for the first time—her fine hair and melancholy eyes, her high color and all her Rubens curves. The experience startled him for a second, as something new in all his experience. He could trace it vaguely only to the strange obscene influence of the statue. But it pleased and flattered him that the emotion should have occurred at all.

Mrs. Weatherby had by now become launched upon her period of religious experiment among the numerous sects of Southern California, but the Princess d'Orobelli arose and, taking the matter firmly in hand, cut her short and at the same time revealed the reason for her coming to the Villa Leonardo. She said, "Do tell us, Mrs. Weatherby, what you know of this Spragg woman? I am dining with friends and must leave soon. I should like to know the story. It will help make the dinner a success. No one is talking of anything else but Miss Annie Spragg."

So that was the reason why the Princess and Father d'Astier had made the hot, dusty journey! They had come to the apparent fount of all knowledge upon the subject of Miss Annie Spragg.

Mrs. Weatherby, upset for a moment at being interrupted in the process of making herself enigmatic, recovered quickly and said, "Of course, I never really knew her any more than I knew her