‘Auntie Iris has written a book!’
‘A book!’ echoed both auditors of the announcement, in keys varying between astonishment and dismay.
‘Yes, and it’s going to be published, and put into a blue cover, and sold, and Auntie Iris is going to make heaps and heaps of money!’
‘What is it to be called?’ said Lady Rossiter rather gloomily, fixing an apprehensive eye on the exuberant niece of the authoress.
‘It’s called, ‘Why, Ben!’ and it’s a Story of the Sexes, ‘ glibly quoted that young lady, unaware of the shock inflicted by this brazen announcement, delivered at the top of her squeaky, nine-year-old voice.
‘Good God!’ said Sir Julian Rossiter.
His wife said, ‘Hush, Julian!’ in a rather automatic aside and turned again to the herald of ‘Why, Ben!’ now hopping exultantly round and round the breakfast-table.
‘Did you get a letter from Aunt Iris this morning, Ruthie?’
‘Daddy did, and he said it was a secret before, but now the publishers had accepted the book and everybody might know, and I said—I said——’
Ruthie consecrated the briefest possible instant to drawing a sufficiently deep breath to enable her to resume her rapid, high-pitched narrative. ‘I said, ‘Me and Peekaboo must come and tell you and Sir Julian, because you’d be so pleased and so excited, and so surprised!”
About the author
Edmée Elizabeth Monica Dashwood, née de la Pasture (9 June 1890 – 2 December 1943), commonly known as E. M. Delafield, was a prolific English author.
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