"Oh, fiddlesticks," laughed Miss Robbins. "Just ate too much, and had a little attack of indigestion, Dick. You'll live to be eighty-nine and a half."
The Judge's eyes twinkled as he gazed at her.
"Still contrary as Adam's off ox, Roxy. Won't even let me have the satisfaction of thinking you saved my life, will you?"
"A good dose of peppermint and soda would have done just as well," answered Roxana serenely, turning to introduce Mrs. Robbins. "He says he wants to make his will, but I think it's only a notion, and he wants company. Still I guess we'll humor him. It seems that he was going to leave everything he had to me. And I just found him out in time. The very idea when he's got Billie, his own grandchild, flesh and blood, and such a darling boy too. He can leave me Billie if he likes, but he can't leave me anything else; so you make it that way, Jerry."
"Leave her Billie, Jerry," sighed the Judge, "leave her Billie, and me too, if she'll take us both."
"Wouldn't have you for a gift, Dick," she answered, cheerful and happy as a girl as she looked down at him. "You're a fussy, spoiled, selfish old man, just as you always was, and I couldn't be bothered with you. But I'll keep an eye on you so you don't kill yourself before your time with sweet corn and peach shortcake, though I suppose it's a pleasant sort of taking off at that. I'll take Billie and Betty with me around the garden while you and Jerry fix up that will, and mind you do it right. Billie's going to have all that belongs to him."
As the door closed behind her, the Judge winked solemnly at Mr. Robbins.
"Finest woman in seven counties. Ought to have been the mother of heroes and statesmen, but there she is, mothering Billie and bossing me to her heart's content. Do you think she'd marry me, Jerry?"
"I don't know, Judge," Mr. Robbins answered, smiling. "Roxy's odd."
"Well, maybe so. Go ahead and make the will as she says. Everything to Billie, and make her guardian. All except," he stopped and his eyes twinkled merrily, "the house in Boston. Jerry, lad, it's got all our wedding furniture still in it just as it was thirty years ago. I bought it and moved the stuff up there after she gave me the mitten, and it's waited for her to change her mind these many years. I married for spite, and my poor wife died after Billie's father was born. Served me right, I guess. Anyhow, the house is there and she can take it or leave it as she likes."