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One Basket by Edna Ferber
page 58 of 196 (29%)
She sat thus for the better part of an hour, motionless except
for one forefinger that was, quite unconsciously, tapping out a
popular and cheap little air that she had been strumming at the
piano the evening before, having bought it downtown that same
afternoon. It had struck Orville's fancy, and she had played it
over and over for him. Her right forefinger was playing the
entire tune, and something in the back of her head was following
it accurately, though the separate thinking process was going on
just the same. Her eyes were bright, and wide, and hot.
Suddenly she became conscious of the musical antics of her
finger. She folded it in with its mates, so that her hand became
a fist. She stood up and stared down at the clutter of the
breakfast table. The egg--that fateful second egg--had congealed
to a mottled mess of yellow and white. The spoon lay on the
cloth. His coffee, only half consumed, showed tan with a cold
gray film over it. A slice of toast at the left of his plate
seemed to grin at her with the semi-circular wedge that he had
bitten out of it.

Terry stared down at these congealing remnants. Then she
laughed, a hard high little laugh, pushed a plate away
contemptuously with her hand, and walked into the sitting room.
On the piano was the piece of music (Bennie Gottschalk's great
song hit, "Hicky Boola") which she had been playing the night
before. She picked it up, tore it straight across, once, placed
the pieces back to back, and tore it across again. Then she
dropped the pieces to the floor.

"You bet I'm going," she said, as though concluding a train of
thought. "You just bet I'm going. Right now!" And Terry went.
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