'Very well, my general. I fly to prepare weapons with
which to fight Satan. You, of course, will take HER; oh, my dear,
I'm almost afraid you oughtn't! I choose the bullet-headed blonde
twin who says his name is "Lanty," and reserve for Edith the
bursting-with-fat brunette twin who calls herself "Ciffy." Edith's
disciplinary powers have been too much vaunted of late; we shall see
if Ciffy ruffles her splendid serenity.'
CHAPTER III--A FAMILY POLYGON
Mrs. Grubb's family circle was really not a circle at all; it was
rather a polygon--a curious assemblage of distinct personages.
There was no unity in it, no membership one of another. It was four
ones, not one four. If some gatherer of statistics had visited the
household, he might have described it thus:-
Mrs. S. Cora Grubb, widow, aged forty years.
'Alisa Bennett, feeble-minded, aged ten or twelve years.
'Atlantic and Pacific Simonson, twins, aged four years.'
The man of statistics might seek in vain for some principle of
attraction or cohesion between these independent elements; but no one
who knew Mrs. Grubb would have been astonished at the sort of family
that had gathered itself about her. Queer as it undoubtedly was at
this period, it had, at various times, been infinitely queerer.
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