“Speakin’ U. S. A., tommyrot!” said Mrs. Temple. “Anyhow, it’s the door o’ the drugstore in this town. They sell more’n sody water down to Danforth’s.”
“What am I to pay the author of Peter and the pies?” I asked.
“Well, seein’s how you keep Peter, as it were, and Mrs. Pillig calc’lates she can rent her house up to Slab City, she’s goin’ to come to you for $20 a month. She’s wuth it, too. You’ll have the best kept and cleanest house in Bentford.”
I rose from the table solemnly. “Mrs. Temple,” said I, “I accept Mrs. Pillig, Peter, and the pies at these terms, but only on one condition: She is never to clean my study!”
“Why?” asked Mrs. Temple.
“Because,” said I, “you can never tell where an orderly woman will put things.”
Bert chuckled as he filled his pipe. Mrs. Temple grinned herself. I was about to make a triumphant exit, when these words from Mrs. Temple’s lips arrested me:
“Bert,” she said, “did you clean the buggy to-day? You know you gotter go over ter the deepot to-morrow an’ git that boarder.”
“That what?” I cried.
Mrs. Bert’s eyes half closed with a purely feminine delight. “Oh, ain’t I told you?” she said innocently. “We’re goin’ ter hev another boarder, a young lady. From Noo York, too. Her health’s broke down, she says, only that’s not the way she said it, and somehow she heard of us. We ain’t never taken many boarders, but I guess our name’s in that old railroad advertisin’ book. I wouldn’t hev took her, only I thought maybe you wuz kind o’ lonesome here with jest us.”