FIRST AID FOR THE MAIN STEM
Well, I ain't been adopted yet; but it's the next thing to it. Me and Zenobia are gettin' to understand each other better every day. And, say, for a ripe old party, she's younger in her mind than lots of folks I know who ain't lived half so long. Maybe she did do her first travelin' up and down Broadway in a horse stage; but that ain't the way she wants to cover the ground now. What do you think she springs at the dinner table the other night? Says she's goin' to the next aviation meet and hire some one to take her up for an aëroplane ride.
"Why, Zenobia!" says Sister Martha, so shocked her white frizzes almost stand up and wiggle.
That's Martha's cue, all right. She don't seem to get used to Zenobia's ways, although they've been livin' together all these years. A genuine, consistent antique, Sister Martha is, who still likes to talk about the time when Horace Greeley ran for President. Accordin' to her conversation the last real sensation that came her way was when she went over to Brooklyn and heard Henry Ward Beecher preach.
But even Martha ain't no worse when you get to know her. She's a harmless, well meanin' old soul, and I'm 'most beginnin' to believe she's pretty near as pious as she thinks she is. Anyway, it ain't any Sunday pose with her. She lugs her religion right through the week, holidays and all, and spreads it around even. I got it straight from Zenobia that Martha's even begun ringin' me into her goodnight prayers, along with the cook and the President.
Also Martha has started in on what she calls my moral trainin', which she dopes out as havin' been neglected somethin' shameful. Whenever Zenobia ain't around to interrupt, I get a Jonah story, or a Sampson and Delilah hair cuttin' yarn pumped into me, and if there ain't any cogs missin' in her scheme I ought to be buddin' a soul before long.
"Torchy," says she real solemn the other night, "I hope you do not use profane language. Do you?"
"Well," says I, "when I was on the Sunday editor's door I did used to think I could put over a few gingery ones; but since I've been with the Corrugated Trust I've kind of got out of practice."
"Ah!" says she, beamin'. "That is good, very good! Your associations are better; is that it?"
"Mainly it's on account of Mr. Ellins," says I. "Maybe you never happened to hear him; but, say, you ought to be there some mornin' when he limps in with the gout in both feet and a hang-over grouch from the day before! Cuss! Why, after listenin' to him grow real enthusiastic once, I got discouraged. What's the use? thinks I."