“What induced you to come to such a place as this, so far off the line of travel?”
“Exactly that,” said the burglar, “because it was off the line of travel and because I have made some of my richest hauls in houses like this.”
“Aren’t you ashamed to be a burglar?” said I, thinking that I might do some missionary work.
“Now see here,” said he, rising from the chair in which he had seated himself after Ethel had gone up stairs, “I did not come here to be catechised or criticised. I came here to do business and I found it was impossible, so let us forget that I am a burglar and that you are a poor man and bend all our energies to retaining the services of your cook. As a fellow American I feel for you and I’d hate to see ‘the Madame’ forced to do her own cooking through any fault of mine. By the way, how’s the larder?”
“The who?”
“The larder. What have you to eat?”
“Oh, I misunderstood you. I guess I can find something to eat. Are you fond of blueberries—not whortleberries, you understand, but blueberries.”
“All the same, ain’t they?”
“Not by a long shot. You’re evidently a city man. A blueberry is to a whortleberry what a wild cherry is to an oxheart. We have plenty of blueberries and some milk and I dare say Minerva can boil you some eggs if you care for them.”
“No, I don’t want to bother you or her. Cooks object to getting extra meals.”