I am here on the sofa, where I flung myself two hours ago, and I
don't think I shall ever get up. There is no reason WHY I ever
should."

MISS SPAULDING, suggestively: "Dinner."

MISS REED: "Oh, dinner! Dinner, to a broken heart!"

MISS SPAULDING: "I don't believe your heart is broken."

MISS REED: "But I tell you it is! I ought to know when my own heart
is broken, I should hope. What makes you think it isn't?"

MISS SPAULDING: "Oh, it's happened so often!"

MISS REED: "But this is a real case. You ought to feel my forehead.
It's as hot!"

MISS SPAULDING: "You ought to get up and help me put this room to
rights, and then you would feel better."

MISS REED: "No; I should feel worse. The idea of household gods
makes me sick. Sylvan deities are what I want; the great god Pan
among the cat-tails and arrow-heads in the 'ma'sh' at Ponkwasset; the
dryads of the birch woods--there are no oaks; the nymphs that haunt
the heights and hollows of the dear old mountain; the" -

MISS SPAULDING: "Wha-a-at? I can't hear a word you say."

MISS REED: "That's because you keep fussing about so. Why don't you