MINNIE DE LA CROIX:
OR THE CROWN OF JEWELS.
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BY ANGELE DE V. HULL.
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(Concluded from page 304.)
“Lord bless us, my children! what a noise,” cried Mr. de la Croix on the morrow as he entered the store-room. “I am deaf! give me some claret and water some of you! I am thirsty enough to swallow bottle and all. I have had lamps fastened to every other tree in the avenue and every column around the piazza.”
Minnie brought him the iced wine and ran off to work again. She was beating eggs for a mayonnaise, and directing the servant behind her in chopping celery and chicken for salad.
Lisa was standing on a table pouring from an immense bowl a stream of icing over a pyramid of cake that stood in a salver on the floor. Rose was frothing eggs for something else, Kate was churning syllabub, and Blanche was pounding almonds.
Mr. de la Croix stopped his ears and called out as loudly as he could, “Halt! order! I want to talk. Where are those great china bowls to be placed, and the pride of Rose’s existence, the diamond-cut wonder—the crystal one? No one can carry them among you here, and I must tell Sampson to do it.”