The Worst Joke in the World

by Elisabeth Sanxay Holding

The Worst Joke in the World

A STORY WHICH THROWS A NEW AND INTERESTING LIGHT
UPON THE TIME-HONORED PROBLEM OF
THE MOTHER-IN-LAW

By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding

Mrs. Champney was putting the very last things into her bag, and Mrs. Maxwell and Mrs. Deane sat watching her. The room in which she had lived for nearly four years was already strange and unfamiliar. The silver toilet articles were gone from the bureau. The cupboard door stood open, showing empty hooks and shelves. The little water colors of Italian scenes had vanished from the walls, and the books from the table. All those things were gone which had so charmed and interested Mrs. Maxwell and Mrs. Deane.

They were old ladies, and to them Jessica Champney at fifty was not old at all. With her gayety, her lively interest in life, and her dainty clothes, she seemed to them altogether young—girlish, even, in her enthusiastic moments, and always interesting. They loved and admired her, and were heavy-hearted at her going.

“You’ve forgotten the pussy cat, Jessica,” Mrs. Maxwell gravely remarked.

“Oh, so I have!” said Mrs. Champney.

Hanging beside the bureau was a black velvet kitten with a strip of sandpaper fastened across its back, and underneath it the inscription:

SCRATCH MY BACK

It was intended, of course, for striking matches. As Mrs. Champney never had occasion to strike a match, this little object was not remarkably useful. Nor, being a woman of taste, would she have admitted that it was in the least ornamental; but it was precious to her—so precious that a sob rose in her throat as she took it down from the wall.