Mrs. Spragg had no sitting-room, and Paul and his father had to be
received in one of the long public parlours, between ladies seated at
rickety desks in the throes of correspondence and groups of listlessly
conversing residents and callers.
The Spraggs were intensely proud of their grandson, and Ralph perceived
that they would have liked to see Paul charging uproariously from group
to group, and thrusting his bright curls and cherubic smile upon the
general attention. The fact that the boy preferred to stand between his
grandfather's knees and play with Mr. Spragg's Masonic emblem, or dangle
his legs from the arm of Mrs. Spragg's chair, seemed to his grandparents
evidence of ill-health or undue repression, and he was subjected by Mrs.
Spragg to searching enquiries as to how his food set, and whether he
didn't think his Popper was too strict with him. A more embarrassing
problem was raised by the "surprise" (in the shape of peanut candy or
chocolate creams) which he was invited to hunt for in Gran'ma's pockets,
and which Ralph had to confiscate on the way home lest the dietary rules
of Washington Square should be too visibly infringed.
Sometimes Ralph found Mrs. Heeny, ruddy and jovial, seated in the
arm-chair opposite Mrs. Spragg, and regaling her with selections from a
new batch of clippings. During Undine's illness of the previous winter
Mrs. Heeny had become a familiar figure to Paul, who had learned to
expect almost as much from her bag as from his grandmother's pockets; so
that the intemperate Saturdays at the Malibran were usually followed by
languid and abstemious Sundays in Washington Square.
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