"Oh, no—Whistlebinkie is still here," said Mollie. "In fact, he let you into the house. Didn't you see him?"
"No, indeed I didn't," said the Unwiseman. "What do you take me for? I'm proud, I am. I wouldn't look at a person who'd open a front door. I come of good family. My father was a Dunderberg and my mother was a Van Scootle. We're one of the oldest families in creation. One of my ancestors was in the Ark, and I had several who were not. It would never do for one in my position to condescend to see a person who opened a front door for pay.
"That's why I don't have servants in my own house. I'd have to speak to them, and the idea of a Dunderberg-Van Scootle engaged in any kind of conversation with servants is not to be thought of. We never did anything for pay in all the history of our family, and we never recognize as equals people who do. That's why I have nothing to do with anybody but children. Most grown up people work."
"I don't see how you live," said Mollie. "How do you pay your bills?"
"Don't have any," said the Unwiseman. "Never had a bill in my life. I leave bills to canary birds and mosquitoes."
"But you have to buy things to eat, don't you?"
"Very seldom," said the Unwiseman. "I'm never hungry; but when I do get hungry I can most generally find something to eat somewhere—apples, for instance. I can live a week on one apple."
"Well, what do you do when you've eaten the apple?" queried Mollie.
"What an absurd question," laughed the Unwiseman. "Didn't you know that there was more than one apple in the world? Every year I find enough apples to last me as long as I think it is necessary to provide. Last year I laid in fifty-three apples so that if I got very hungry one week I could have two—or maybe I could give a dinner and invite my friends, and they could have the extra apple. Don't you see?"
"Well, you are queer, for a fact!" said Mollie, getting a large lemon out of the pantry closet and cutting it in half.