“I wouldn’t mind at all if there was an inch or two to move in to. When you have a kitchen like this you’re evidently expected to hire your maid by measure. Who’s her admirer?”
“Oh, every man in the house.”
“Are any of them possible?”
I pried her back from the stove and inserted myself between her and it, feeling like a flower being pressed in the leaves of a book.
“No, not very possible.”
“I’ll have to see what I can do.”
As I poured the water on the tea I couldn’t help saying over my shoulder:
“There’s Mr. Albertson. He’s still unclaimed in the ‘Found’ Department.”
Mr. Albertson hadn’t loved me at first sight and Betty feels rather sore about it. She drew a deep breath, thereby crushing me against the front of the stove.
“No,” she said consideringly. “He won’t do. He’s too old and too matter-of-fact. Besides, I want him for one of the Geary girls, my second cousins, who live up in the Bronx and make shoe bags. I’m not sure which he’ll like best, so to-morrow night I’m having them both to dine with him.”