Eunice ran out, thinking to herself,—
“I won’t tell her, after all, and she’ll think she’s forgotten it, as usual.”
Cricket took her turn at the spoon.
“There,” she thought, “the girls never said a word about the flavouring, and I just s’pose they’ve gone and forgotten it, as usual. I’ll put it in myself, and just as they think they’ve got to take the can out, I’ll tell them. Let me see. We always have lemon or vanilla. Essence of wintergreen. Wintergreen candy is lovely. I’ll just put in some wintergreen,” and she took the bottle hastily, after turning for a spoon.
“Oh! oh! it’s peppermint I’ve got,” she exclaimed, in dismay, as the first spoonful went into the mixture. “Bah! I don’t like peppermint, I’ll just put in an extra amount of wintergreen to cover it up. Cook says she often mixes flavours.” And in went plenty of wintergreen. By this time the whole pantry had a strong odour of essences, principally peppermint.
“What a strong smell!” said Marjorie, coming back. “What’s the peppermint bottle doing down here with the cork out?” But Cricket vanished, and Marjorie, concluding that the cook had come in and used it, corked it up, and put it back.
“How horribly strong that peppermint is,” she said, as she stirred her cream. “That bottle, just open for a moment, has scented everything, or perhaps some of it was spilled.”
Archie appeared now to carry out the cream to pour in the can.
“Whew! peppermint!” he whistled.
“Yes; cook has been using some here, and left the bottle uncorked. Awful, isn’t it?”