Everything was damp hut
his ardor.
However, with characteristic good nature he squeezed the water out
of his pockets and declared that it was just the kind of exercise
he needed. He made me promise not to tell Aunt Martha, because she
was very much opposed to his going in bathing on account of the
undertow. Then I sneaked him up to his room and left him to change
his clothes.
On the piazza I found Clara J., her face shrouded in the after-glow
of a wintry sunset.
She handed me a telegram minus the envelope and asked me, with a
voice that was intended to be cuttingly sarcastic, "Is there any
answer?"
I opened the message and read:
New York.
John Henry,
Jiggersville, N. Y.
The two queens will be out this afternoon. They are good girls so
treat them white.
Bunch.
The unspeakable idiot, to send me a wire worded like that! No
wonder Clara J. was sitting on the ice cream freezer! Of course
it only meant that Bunch's sister and her daughter were coming out
to look at their property, but--suffering mackerel! what an eye
Clara J. was giving me!
"And who are the two queens?" she queried, bitterly.
My face grew redder and redder. Every minute I expected to turn
into a complete boiled lobster. I could see somebody reaching for
the mayonaise to sprinkle me.
"Well," she continued, "is there no answer? Of course, they are
good girls, and you'll treat them white, but--" Then the heavens
opened and the floods descended.
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