“There are as many styles of teakettles as there are teakettles, tall and narrow, short and squat, with snouts of all shapes.”
“Heavens! Still no light on the subject! Tucker, what is your opinion of the war? Will it last much longer?”
“I hope not, although I hear it is an excellent way to dispose of last year’s teakettles. They are using so many of them in the Red Cross service.”
“Oh, come now! I must do better than this. Mrs. Carter, have you any of these teakettles about you?”
“No, Mr. Parker, I haven’t a single teakettle—ye-et,” rather sadly.
“Mr. Smith!” That young aviator, not expecting to be called on, almost fell out of the tree, which would have been an ignominious proceeding for one accustomed to the dizzy heights of the clouds. “Do you come across any of this stuff, whatever it is that these crazy folks call teakettles?”
“Yes, I do occasionally. Even here in this camp there is a lot of the stuff that teakettles are made of—the raw material, I might say, but if I should, no doubt future teakettles would climb up the tree and mob me.”
“‘Debutantes!’ ‘Debutantes!’ That is the word! Stupid of me not to guess it sooner. Thank you, Miss Dum, for the compliment you just paid me, or did you mean your father? Because I understand that he is somewhat fond of young girls himself.”
“I meant you in the game—but Zebedee in reality,” declared Dum, who had no more idea of coquetting than a real teakettle.
“Mr. Smith is ‘It’!” shouted Lucy. “We are going to get a hard one for him.”