"Sure I did. Bill commissioned me to get him a cook, dishwasher, milkmaid and wood chopper,"—
"Hold on, Mr. Jack, I draw the line on milking. Ugh! I tried it once down at Uncle John's and I squirted my eyes full of milk. You need not laugh so. Uncle John just laughed fit to kill himself. That wasn't half so bad as Hazel, though. She tried to put blankets over the little pigs so they would keep warm, and when the old pig chased her"—
"You stop, stop, stop! Fire! Water!" screamed Hazel and no one ever found out what happened during the chase.
Then sister Katherine wanted something.
"Jack, you know what you promised to get me once, and you said when you had enough money you would buy me a nice canary and brass cage, and now that you have got it—such lots of it—won't you keep your word?"
"They raise larger and louder voiced birds in the west than they do in the Hartz mountains. The 'Rocky mountain canary' is the greatest warbler on earth. I have my mind on one that is a daisy and when I come back you shall surely have it."
"Oh, Jack, you are so good," murmured she.
Jack's eyes twinkled as he thought of the joke he would have on Katherine, but he never said a word. Turning to Hazel he said: "Well, Lady Jack, what do you think of my chaperoning a dusky maiden for several years in her search for a continuous performance of good deeds, hospitals, nurses and the study of political and social economy? Do you think her thirst will find a quencher?"
"Oh, Jack, go by all means, only don't attempt to get her into any clubs or societies and expect me to help you out. I recommended Daisy Deane for initiation in our B. A. F. club,—you know 'Bachelors Are Forbidden,' and she got one black ball. Daisy is a stenographer, you know, and her employer is Mr. Doolittle and Mrs. Doolittle is our High Priestess."
"Yes," said Jack curtly, "and she does not belie her name, I guess."