ready
inveterate? Truly, she must be perilously near it. And oh, wasn't
this a far, far worse sort of _inveterateness_ than the Pritchard sort?
And if Cousin Julia had dreaded that, how, pray, would she feel in
regard to this?

Rising suddenly, Elsie rushed into her own room as if she were running
away from the visions she had conjured. As she made herself tidy for
dinner, her desperation grasped at a third expedient, a middle way.
Couldn't she get around the difficulty by preventing or forestalling
the introduction of any doubtful topic into the conversation? During
the time that would elapse between Mr. Graham's arrival and Cousin
Julia's return--three-quarters of an hour at the longest, she
supposed--she would keep him from bringing up any matter of
resemblances, of big dimples, of madonnas, or sticky babies. She would
monopolize the conversation, so far as she could, and direct it all the
time. At the risk of utterly losing the good opinion of one of Cousin
Julia's most valued friends, of appearing forward, conceited, tiresome,
she would rattle on like the empty-headed society girl in certain
modern plays. She would introduce utterly impersonal subjects, such
as--at the moment she couldn't think of anything but prohibition, which
would last about two minutes--and chatter foolishly and fast upon them,
one after another. Then, if she exhausted them and all else failed,
she would make such pointed and brazen references to her own singing
that he would be obliged to ask her to sing--and once going, she could
easily keep that up until Cousin Julia came to the rescue. And she
certainly wouldn't sing "Elsie Marley" nor anything that would in any
way remind Mr. Graham of it. Either she would shock that elegant
gentleman's taste with the ugliest of ragtime, or she would inflict him
with a succession of the operatic selections she had taken up with
Madame Valentini. The latter choice would probably, upon Miss
Pritchard's arrival, serve to bring up the unhappy matter of her
abandoning the stage for music, but that would be a minor evil.

Mr. Graham appeared promptly at the hour Miss Pritchard had predicted,
and Elsie greeted him in the role she had chosen and proceeded to give
him a gushing account of their journey back to New York at the end of
the summer. The artist, who had looked forward to seeing again the
charming little creature who had been such a vision of grace and
loveliness as she had sung and danced