"I'd like to see Debbie's young man," she mused, a smile twisting the corners of her mouth. "He ought to be a giant. Anyway, I feel sorry for him if he isn't. Dear funny old Debbie—won't Chet and I have a picnic to-night?"
And as she had predicted, they did have the time of their lives. Chet refused to sit in the dining-room in lonely state, and in masterly fashion invaded the kitchen.
"Say, that smells good, Billie, old girl," and he sniffed hungrily at the stew. "Give me an apron and I'll help."
"Oh, look who wants to help," cried Billie, finding an apron nevertheless and tying it around his waist so that he looked like a butcher's assistant. "You will probably only get under my feet and bother me to death, but I suppose I'll have to humor you. There, if you must do something, set the table."
Now Chet did not want to set the table—it took him too far from the appetizing aromas in the kitchen. However, he obeyed grumblingly and was finally rewarded by being given a steaming dish of stew to carry in.
"Chet," screamed Billie, following him in and checking him just as he was in the act of putting the hot dish on the tablecloth, "put a protector under it. Don't you know," as Chet started and looked reproachfully at her, "that you are apt to ruin the table? And it's almost a brand new one at that."
"Well, you needn't scare a fellow to death," grumbled Chet. "I thought
I'd stepped on the cat." But he obeyed instructions.
"My! but doesn't everything look good?" cried Billie, sniffing hungrily. "Hurry up, Chet, take off your apron and dish up the stew while I pour the coffee. What do you know about that? I made the coffee. And doesn't it smell good?"
It was the jolliest of meals and finished up in royal fashion with the peach pie and whipped cream.
In a very gale of merriment Chet and Billie cleared away the dinner dishes, and then, being tired by the unusual exertion, decided to go early to bed.