"Copy" : A Dialogue

Mrs. Ambrose Dale--forty, slender, still young--sits in her drawing-room
at the tea-table. The winter twilight is falling, a lamp has been lit,
there is a fire on the hearth, and the room is pleasantly dim and
flower-scented. Books are scattered everywhere--mostly with autograph
inscriptions "From the Author"--and a large portrait of_ Mrs. Dale,
_at her desk, with papers strewn about her, takes up one of the
wall-panels. Before_ Mrs. Dale _stands_ Hilda, _fair and twenty,
her hands full of letters_.

_Mrs. Dale_. Ten more applications for autographs? Isn't it strange
that people who'd blush to borrow twenty dollars don't scruple to beg for
an autograph?

_Hilda (reproachfully)_. Oh--

_Mrs. Dale_. What's the difference, pray?

_Hilda_. Only that your last autograph sold for fifty--

_Mrs. Dale (not displeased)_. Ah?--I sent for you, Hilda, because I'm
dining out to-night, and if there's nothing important to attend to among
these letters you needn't sit up for me.

_Hilda_. You don't mean to work?

_Mrs. Dale_. Perhaps; but I sha'n't need you. You'll see that my
cigarettes and coffee-machine are in place, and: that I don't have to crawl
about the floor in search of my pen-wiper? That's all. Now about these
letters--

_Hilda (impulsively)_. Oh, Mrs. Dale--

_Mrs. Dale_. Well?

_Hilda_. I'd rather sit up for you.

_Mrs. Dale_. Child, I've nothing for you to do. I shall be blocking
out the tenth chapter of _Winged Purposes_ and it won't be ready for
you till next week.

_Hilda_. It isn't that--but it's so beautiful to sit here, watching
and listening, all alone in the night, and to feel that you're in there
_(she points to the study-door)_ _creating_--._(Impulsively.)_
What do I care for sleep?

_Mrs. Dale (indulgently)_. Child--silly child!--Yes, I should have
felt so at your age--it would have been an inspiration--

_Hilda (rapt)_. It is!

_Mrs. Dale_. But you must go to bed; I must have you fresh in the
morning; for you're still at the age when one is fresh in the morning!
_(She sighs.)_ The letters? _(Abruptly.)_ Do you take notes of
what you feel, Hilda--here, all alone in the night, as you say?

_Hilda (shyly)_. I have--

_Mrs. Dale (smiling)_. For the diary?

_Hilda (nods and blushes)_.

_Mrs. Dale (caressingly)_. Goose!--Well, to business. What is there?

_Hilda_. Nothing important, except a letter from Stroud & Fayerweather
to say that the question of the royalty on _Pomegranate Seed_ has been
settled in your favor. The English publishers of _Immolation_ write
to consult you about a six-shilling edition; Olafson, the Copenhagen
publisher, applies for permission to bring