The Christmas holidays came again, but throughout the week, Gifford & Company's store kept open until eight o'clock, every evening, with Jack Ogden behind the counter. He got so tired that he hardly cared about it when they raised his salary to twenty-five dollars a week, just after Mr. Gifford saw him come down town with another coffee and tea dealer, whose store was in the same street.
"We mustn't let him leave us, Jones," Mr. Gifford had said to his head clerk. "I am going to send him to Washington next week."
Not many days later, Mrs. Guilderaufenberg in her home at Washington was told by her maid servant that, "There's a strange b'y below, ma'am, who sez he's a-wantin' to spake wid yez."
Down went the landlady into the parlor, and then up went her hands.
"Oh, Mr. Jackogden! How glad I am to see you! You haf come! I gif you the best stateroom in my house."
"I believe I'm here," said Jack, shaking hands heartily. "How is Mr. Guilderaufenberg and how is Miss—"
"Oh, Miss Hildebrand," she said, "she will be so glad, and so will Mrs. Smith. She avay with her husband. He is a Congressman from far vest. You will call to see her."
"Mrs. Smith?" exclaimed Jack, but in another second he understood it, and asked after his old friend with the unpronounceable name as well as after Miss Hildebrand.
"She has a name, now, that I can speak! I'm glad Smith isn't a Polish name," he said to himself.
"Oh, Mr. Jackogden!" exclaimed Mrs. Guilderaufenberg, a moment later. "How haf you learned to speak German? She will be so astonish!"