Polly looked away from everybody and gazed straight into the blaze.

“I have been thinking over a plan for my future work,” she said, “and I want to tell it to you and see if you all approve and think me equal to it.  It used to come to me in flashes, after this Fairy Godmother of mine opened an avenue for my surplus energy by sending me out as a story-teller; but lately I have n’t had any heart for it.  Work grew monotonous and disagreeable and hopeless, and I ’m afraid I had no wish to be useful or helpful to myself or to anybody else.  But now everything is different.  I am not so rich as I was (I wish, Mr. Bird, you would not smile so provokingly when I mention my riches!), and I must not be idle any longer; so this is my plan, I want to be a story-teller by profession.  Perhaps you will say that nobody has ever done it; but surely that is an advantage; I should have the field to myself for a while, at least.  I have dear Mrs. Bird’s little poor children as a foundation.  Now, I would like to get groups of other children together in somebody’s parlor twice a week and tell them stories,—­the older children one day in the week and the younger ones another.  Of course I have n’t thought out all the details, because I hoped my Fairy Godmother would help me there, if she approved of my plan; but I have ever so many afternoons all arranged, and enough stories and songs at my tongue’s end for three months.  Do you think it impossible or nonsensical, Mr. Bird?”

“No,” said he thoughtfully, after a moment’s pause.  “It seems on the first hearing to be perfectly feasible.  In fact, in one sense it will not be an experiment at all.  You have tried your powers, gained self-possession and command of your natural resources; developed your ingenuity, learned the technicalities of your art, so to speak, already.  You propose now, as I understand, to extend your usefulness, widen your sphere of action, address yourself to a larger public, and make a profession out of what was before only a side issue in your life.  It’s a new field, and it ’s a noble one, taken in its highest aspect, as you have always taken it.  My motto for you, Polly, is Goethe’s couplet:—­

  “’What you can do, or dream you can, begin it. 
  Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it.’”

“Make way for the story-teller!” cried Edgar.  “I will buy season tickets for both your groups, if you will only make your limit of age include me.  I am only five feet ten, and I ’ll sit very low if you ’ll admit me to the charmed circle.  Shall you have a stage name?  I would suggest ‘The Seraphic Sapphira.’”

“Now, don’t tease,” said Polly, with dignity; “this is in sober earnest.  What do you think, Fairy Godmother?  I ’ve written to my dear Miss Mary Denison in Santa Barbara, and she likes the idea.”

“I think it is charming.  In fact, I can hardly wait to begin.  I will be your business manager, my Pollykins, and we ’ll make it a success, if it is possible.  If you ’ll take me into your confidence and tell me what you mean to do, I will plan the hows and whens and wheres.”