"It might make 'em laugh so they'd have fits; and then they couldn't burgle."
"Oh, they might!" said Whistlebinkie. "It might make 'em laugh so they'd have fits, and then they couldn't burgle. But what is that other placard he has pinned on the wall?"
"That," said Mollie, as she investigatedthe second placard, "that seems to be a lot of rules for the kitchen. He's a queer old man for placards, isn't he?"
"Indeed he is," said Whistlebinkie. "What do the rules say?"
"I'll get 'em down," said Mollie, mounting a chair and removing the second placard from the wall. Then she and Whistlebinkie read the following words:
1. No cook under two years of age unaccompanied by nurse or parent aloud in this kitching.3. Boyled eggs must never be cooked in the frying pan, and when fried eggs are ordered the cook must remember not to scramble them. This rule is printed ahed of number too, because it is more important than it.2. Butcher boys are warned not to sit on the ranje while the fiyer is going because allthe heat in the fiyer is needed for cooking. Butcher boys who violate this rule will be charged for the cole consumed in burning them.
1. No cook under two years of age unaccompanied by nurse or parent aloud in this kitching.
3. Boyled eggs must never be cooked in the frying pan, and when fried eggs are ordered the cook must remember not to scramble them. This rule is printed ahed of number too, because it is more important than it.
2. Butcher boys are warned not to sit on the ranje while the fiyer is going because allthe heat in the fiyer is needed for cooking. Butcher boys who violate this rule will be charged for the cole consumed in burning them.
"The fiyer must not be allowed to go out without someboddy with it."
7. The fiyer must not be aloud to go out without some boddy with it, be cause fiyers are dangerous and might set the house on fiyer. Any cook which lets the house burn down through voilating this rule will have the value of the house subtracted from her next month's wages, with interestat forety persent from the date of the fiyer.11. Brekfist must be reddy at all hours, and shall consist of boyled eggs or something else.4. Wages will be pade according to work done on the following skale:
7. The fiyer must not be aloud to go out without some boddy with it, be cause fiyers are dangerous and might set the house on fiyer. Any cook which lets the house burn down through voilating this rule will have the value of the house subtracted from her next month's wages, with interestat forety persent from the date of the fiyer.
11. Brekfist must be reddy at all hours, and shall consist of boyled eggs or something else.
4. Wages will be pade according to work done on the following skale:
For cooking one egg one hour1 cent.For cooking one leg of lamb one week3 cent.For cooking pann cakes per duzzen2 cent.For cooking gravey, per kwart1 cent.For stooing proons per hundred2 cent.
In making up bills against me cooks must add the figewers right, and substract from the whole the following charges:
In making up bills against me cooks must add the figewers right, and substract from the whole the following charges:
For rent of kitchchen per day10 cents.For use of pans and kittles15 cents.For cole, per nugget3 cents.Matches, kindeling and gas per day20 cents.Food consoomed in tasting30 cents.Sundries50 cents.
13. These rules must be obayed.
13. These rules must be obayed.
Yoors Trooly,The Unwiseman.
P. S. Ennyboddy violating these rules will be scolded. Yoors Tooly,
P. S. Ennyboddy violating these rules will be scolded. Yoors Tooly,
The Unwiseman.
Whistlebinkie was rolling on the floor convulsed with laughter by the time Mollie finished reading these rules. He knew enough about house-keeping to know how delightful they were, and if the Unwiseman could have seen him he would doubtless have been very much pleased at his appreciation.
"The funny part of it all is, though," said Mollie, "that the poor old man doesn't keep a cook at all, but does all his own housework."
"Let's see what kind of a dining-room he has got," said Whistlebinkie, recovering from his convulsion. "I wonder which way it is."
"It must be in there to the right," said Mollie. "That is, it must if that sign inthe passage-way means anything. Don't you see, Whistlebinkie, it says: 'This way to the dining-room,' and under it it has 'Caution: meals must not be served in the parlor'?"
"So it has," said Whistlebinkie, reading the sign. "Let's go in there."
So the two little strangers walked into the dining-room, and certainly if the kitchen was droll in the matter of placards, the dining-room was more so, for directly over the table and suspended from the chandelier were these
Guests will please remember to remove their hats before sitting down at the tabel.Soup will not be helped more than three times to any guest, no matter who.It is forbidding for guests to criticize the cooking, or to converse with the waiteress."Guest's will kindly not make fun of the host."Guest's will kindly not contradict or make fun of their host, since he is very irritable and does not like to be contradicted or made fun of. Guests will oblige their host by not asking for anything that is not on the bill of fare. In a private house like this it would be very awkward to have to serve guests with fried potatoes at a time when ice-cream or mince pie has been ordered.Horses and wheelbarrows are not aloudin this dining-room under any circumstances whatever.Neither must cows or hay scales be brought here. Guests bringing their own olives will be charged extra. Also their own assalted ammonds. Spoons, platters, and gravy boats taken from the table must be paid for at market rates for articles so taken away.Any guest caught violating any or all of these rules will not be aloud any dessert whatever; and a second voilition will deprive them of a forth helping to roast beef and raisins.
Guests will please remember to remove their hats before sitting down at the tabel.
Soup will not be helped more than three times to any guest, no matter who.
It is forbidding for guests to criticize the cooking, or to converse with the waiteress.
"Guest's will kindly not make fun of the host."
Guest's will kindly not contradict or make fun of their host, since he is very irritable and does not like to be contradicted or made fun of. Guests will oblige their host by not asking for anything that is not on the bill of fare. In a private house like this it would be very awkward to have to serve guests with fried potatoes at a time when ice-cream or mince pie has been ordered.
Horses and wheelbarrows are not aloudin this dining-room under any circumstances whatever.
Neither must cows or hay scales be brought here. Guests bringing their own olives will be charged extra. Also their own assalted ammonds. Spoons, platters, and gravy boats taken from the table must be paid for at market rates for articles so taken away.
Any guest caught violating any or all of these rules will not be aloud any dessert whatever; and a second voilition will deprive them of a forth helping to roast beef and raisins.
Yoors Tooly,The Unwiseman.
N. G. Any guest desiring to substitute his own rules for the above is at libbity to do so, provided he furnishes his own dining-room.
N. G. Any guest desiring to substitute his own rules for the above is at libbity to do so, provided he furnishes his own dining-room.
"They're the most ridiculous rules I everheard of," said Mollie, with a grin so broad that it made her ears uncomfortable. "The idea of having to tell anybody not to wear a hat at the table! He might just as well have made a rule forbidding people to throw plates on the floor."
"I dessay he would have, if he'd thought of it," returned Whistlebinkie. "But just look at these rules for the waitress. They are worse than the others." Then Whistlebinkie read off the rules the Unwiseman had made for the waitress, as follows:
1. Iced water must never be served boiling, nor under any circumstances must ice-cream come to the tabel fried to a crisp.2. Waiteresses caught upsetting the roast beef on a guest's lap will be charged for the beef at the rate of $1.00 a pound, and will have to go to bed without her brekfist.3. All cakes, except lady-fingers, must beserved in the cake basket. The lady-fingers must be served in finger bowls, whether this is what the waiteress is used to or not. This is my dining-room, and I am the one to make the rules for it.4. All waiteresses must wear caps. Their caps must be lace caps, and not yotting caps, tennis caps, or gun caps. The caps must be worn on the head, and not on the hands or feet. All waiteresses caught voilating this rule will not be allowed any pie for eight weeks.5. Meals must not be served until they are ready, and such silly jokes as putting an empty soup tureen on the table for the purpose of fooling me will be looked upon with disfavor and not laughed at.6. Waiteresses must never invite their friends here to take dinner with me unless I am out, and they mustn't do it then either, because this is my dining-room, and I can wear it out quick enough without any outside help.7. Waiteresses must not whistle while waitering on the tabel, because it isn't proper that they should. Besides, girls can't whistle, anyhow.8. At all meals dessert must be served at every other course. In serving a dinner this course should be followed:
1. Iced water must never be served boiling, nor under any circumstances must ice-cream come to the tabel fried to a crisp.
2. Waiteresses caught upsetting the roast beef on a guest's lap will be charged for the beef at the rate of $1.00 a pound, and will have to go to bed without her brekfist.
3. All cakes, except lady-fingers, must beserved in the cake basket. The lady-fingers must be served in finger bowls, whether this is what the waiteress is used to or not. This is my dining-room, and I am the one to make the rules for it.
4. All waiteresses must wear caps. Their caps must be lace caps, and not yotting caps, tennis caps, or gun caps. The caps must be worn on the head, and not on the hands or feet. All waiteresses caught voilating this rule will not be allowed any pie for eight weeks.
5. Meals must not be served until they are ready, and such silly jokes as putting an empty soup tureen on the table for the purpose of fooling me will be looked upon with disfavor and not laughed at.
6. Waiteresses must never invite their friends here to take dinner with me unless I am out, and they mustn't do it then either, because this is my dining-room, and I can wear it out quick enough without any outside help.
7. Waiteresses must not whistle while waitering on the tabel, because it isn't proper that they should. Besides, girls can't whistle, anyhow.
8. At all meals dessert must be served at every other course. In serving a dinner this course should be followed:
1.Pie.2.Soup.3.Custard.4.Roast Beef.5.Ice-cream.6.Sallad.7.Pudding.8.Coffee.9.More Pudding.
9. In case there is not enough of anything to go around more will be sent for at the waiteresses' expense, because the chances are she has been tasting it, which she hadn't any business to do.10. To discourage waiteresses in losing spoons, and knives, and forks, any waiteress caught losing a spoon or a knife and a fork will have the price of two spoons, two knives, and two forks substracted off of her next month's wages.
9. In case there is not enough of anything to go around more will be sent for at the waiteresses' expense, because the chances are she has been tasting it, which she hadn't any business to do.
10. To discourage waiteresses in losing spoons, and knives, and forks, any waiteress caught losing a spoon or a knife and a fork will have the price of two spoons, two knives, and two forks substracted off of her next month's wages.
Yoors Tooly,The Unwiseman.
"Riteing rules isn't easy work."
N. G. All waiteresses who don't like these rules would better apply for some other place somewhere else, because I'm not going to take the trouble to get up a lot of good rules like these and then not have them obeyed. Riteing rules isn't easy work.
N. G. All waiteresses who don't like these rules would better apply for some other place somewhere else, because I'm not going to take the trouble to get up a lot of good rules like these and then not have them obeyed. Riteing rules isn't easy work.
"Well I declare!" said Mollie, when they had finished reading. "I don't wonder he has to live in his little old house all by himself. I don't believe he'd get anybody to stay here a minute, if those rules had to be minded."
"Oh, I don't know," said Whistlebinkie. "They all seem reasonable enough."
"I think I'll take 'em down and show them to my mamma," said Mollie, reaching out to do as she said.
"No, no, don't do that," said Whistlebinkie. "That wouldn't be right. They are his property, and it would never do for you to steal them."
"That's so," said Mollie. "I guess you are right."
"If you want to steal something why don't you do as he asked you to?" put in Whistlebinkie.
"What did he ask me to do?"
"Why don't you remember the notice to burglars?"
"Oh, yes!" said Mollie, "if you must steal something, steal a boyled egg."
"Oh, yes!" said Mollie. "'If you must steal something steal a boyled egg.'"
"That's it. He doesn't like boyled eggs."
"And neither do I," said Mollie. "Particularly when they are as hard as bullets."
And then hearing the tinkle of the tea bell at home Mollie and Whistlebinkie left the Unwiseman's house without stealing anything, which after all was the best thing to do.
"Should any queen read these lines, the author hopes she will see that her daughter is brought up to look after household affairs."
had been very busy setting things to rights in Cinderella's house one autumn afternoon not long after her visit to the Unwiseman. Cinderella was a careless Princess, who allowed her palace to get into a very untidy condition every two or three weeks. Bric-a-brac would be strewn here and there about the floor; clocks would be found standing upside down in the fire-places; andirons and shoe buttons would litter up the halls and obstruct the stairways—inshort, all things would get topsy-turvy within the doors of the Princess' house, and all because Princesses are never taught house-keeping. Should any King or Queen read these lines, the author hopes that his or her Majesty will take the hint and see to it that his or her daughters are properly brought up and taught to look after household affairs, for if they do not, most assuredly the time may come when the most magnificent palace in the world will be allowedto go to ruin through mere lack of attention.
It was a long and hard task for the little mistress of the nursery, but she finally accomplished it; apple-pie order once more ruled in the palace, the Princess' diamonds had been swept up from the floor, and stored away in the bureau drawers, and Mollie was taking a well-earned rest in her rocking-chair over by the window. As she gazed out upon the highway upon which the window fronted, she saw in the dim light a strange shadow passing down the walk, and in a minute the front door-bell rang. Supposing it to be no one but the boy with the evening paper, Mollie did not stir as she would have done if it had been her papa returning home. The paper boy possessed very little interest to her—indeed, I may go so far as to say that Mollie despised the paper boy, not because he was a paper boy, but because he was rude, and had, upon several occasionsrecently made faces at her and told her she didn't know anything because she was a girl, and other mean things like that; as if being a girl kept one from finding out useful and important things. So, as I have said, she sat still and gazed thoughtfully out of the window.
Her thoughts were interrupted in a moment, however, by a most extraordinary proceeding at the nursery door. It suddenly flew open with a bang, and Whistlebinkie came tumbling in head over heels, holding the silver card-receiver in his hand, and whistling like mad from excitement.
"Cardfew," he tooted through the top of his hat. "Nwiseman downstairs."
"What are you trying to say, Whistlebinkie?" asked Mollie, severely.
"Here is a card for you," said Whistlebinkie, standing up and holding out the salver upon which lay, as he had hinted, a card. "The gentleman is below."
Mollie picked up the card, which read this way:
Mr. ME.My House.
"What on earth does it mean?" cried Mollie, with a smile, the card seemed so droll.
"It is the Unwiseman's card. He has called on you, and is downstairs in the parlor—and dear me, how funny he does look," roared Whistlebinkie breathlessly. "He's got on a beaver hat, a black evening coat like your papa wears to the theatre or to dinners, a pair of goloshes, and white tennis trousers. Besides that he's got an umbrella with him, and he's sitting in the parlor with it up over his head."
Whistlebinkie threw himself down on the floor in a spasm of laughter as he thought of the Unwiseman's appearance. Mollie meanwhile was studying the visitor's card.
"What does he mean by 'My House'?" she asked.
"That's his address, I suppose," said Whistlebinkie. "But what shall I tell him? Are you in?"
"Of course I'm in," Mollie replied, and before Whistlebinkie could get upon his feet again she had flown out of the room, down the stairs to the parlor, where, sure enough, as Whistlebinkie had said, the Unwiseman sat, his umbrella raised above his head, looking too prim and absurd for anything.
"How do you do, Miss Whistlebinkie?" he said, gravely, as Mollie entered the room. "I believe that is the correct thing to say when you are calling, though for my part I can't see why. People do so many things that there's a different way to do almost all of them. If I said, 'how do you do your sums?' of course there could be a definite answer. 'I do them by adding, or by substracting.' If any one calling on me shouldsay, 'how do you do?' I'd say, 'excuse me, but how do I do what?' However, I wish to be ruled by etiquette, and as I understand that is the proper question to begin with, I will say again, 'how do you do, Miss Whistlebinkie?' According to my etiquette book it is your turn to reply, and what you ought to say is, 'I'm very well, I thank you, how are you?' I'm very well."
"I'm delighted to hear it, Mr. Me," returned Mollie, glad of the chance to say something. "I have thought a great deal about you lately."
"So have I," said the Unwiseman. "I've been thinking about myself all day. I like to think about pleasant things. I've been intending to return your call for a long time, but really I didn't know exactly how to do it. You see, some things are harder to return than other things. If I borrowed a book from you, and wanted to return it, I'd know how in a minute. I'd just take thebook, wrap it up in a piece of brown paper, and send it back by mail or messenger—or both, in case it happened to be a male messenger. Same way with a pair of andirons. Just return 'em by sending 'em back—but calls are different, and that's what I've come to see you about. I don't know how to return that call."
"But this is the return of the call," said Mollie.
"I don't see how," said the Unwiseman, with a puzzled look on his face. "This isn't the same call at all. The call you made at my house was another one. This arrangement is about the same as it would be in the case of my borrowing a book on Asparagus from you, and returning a book on Sweet Potatoes to you. That wouldn't be a return of your book. It would be returningmybook. Don't you see? Now, I want to be polite and return your call, but I can't. I can't find it. It's come and gone. I almostwish you hadn't called, it's puzzled me so. Finally, I made up my mind to come here, and apologize to you for not returning it. That's all I can do."
"Don't mention it," said Mollie.
"Oh, but I must! How could I apologize without mentioning it?" said the Unwiseman, hastily. "You wouldn't know what I was apologizing for if I didn't mention it. How have you been?"
"Quite well," said Mollie. "I've been very busy this fall getting my dolls' dresses made and setting everything to rights. Won't you—ah—won't you put down your umbrella, Mr. Me?"
"No, thank you," said the unwiseman, with an anxious peep at the ceiling.
"No, thank you," said the Unwiseman, with an anxious peep at the ceiling. "I am very timid about other people's houses, Miss Whistlebinkie. I have been told that sometimes houses fall down without any provocation, and while I don't doubt that your house is well built and all that, some nail somewheremight give way and the whole thing might come down. As long as I have the umbrella over my head I am safe, but without it the ceiling, in case the house did fall, would be likely to spoil my hat. This is a pretty parlor you have. They call it white and gold, I believe."
"Yes," said Mollie. "Mamma is very fond of parlors of that kind."
"So am I," said the Unwiseman. "I have one in my own house."
"Indeed?" said Mollie. "I didn't see it."
"I don't like to get angry."
"You were in it, only you didn't know it," observed the Unwiseman. "It was that room with the walls painted brown. I was afraid the white and gold walls would get spotted if I didn't do something to protect them, so I had a coat of brown paint put over the whole room. Good idea that, I think, and all mine, too. I'd get it patented, if I wasn't afraid somebody would make an improvement on it, and get all the moneythat belonged to me, which would make me very angry. I don't like to get angry, because when I do I always break something valuable, and I find that when I break anything valuable I get angrier than ever, and go ahead and break something else. If I got angry once I never could stop until I'd broken all the valuable things in the world, and when they were all gone where would I be?"
"But it seems to me," said Mollie, as she puzzled over the Unwiseman's idea, of which he seemed unduly proud, "it seems to me that if you cover a white and gold parlor with a coat of brown paint, it doesn't stay a white and gold parlor. It becomes a brown parlor."
"Not at all," returned the Unwiseman. "How do you make that out? Put it this way: You, for instance, are a white girl, aren't you?"
"Yes," said Mollie.
"That is, they call you white, though really you are a pink girl. However, for the sake of the argument, you are white."
"Certainly," said Mollie, anxious to be instructed.
"And you wear clothes to protect you."
"I do."
"Now if you wore a brown dress, would you cease to be a white girl and become a nigrio?"
"A what?" cried Mollie.
"A nigrio—a little brown darky girl," said the Unwiseman.
"No," said Mollie. "I'd still be a white or pink girl, whatever color I was before."
"Well—that's the way with my white and gold parlor. It's white and gold, and I giveit a brown dress for protection. That's all there is to it. I see you keep your vases on the mantel-piece. Queer notion that. Rather dangerous, I should think."
Mollie laughed.
"Dangerous?" she cried. "Why not at all. They're safe enough, and the mantel-piece is the place for them, isn't it? Where do you keep yours?"
"I don't have any. I don't believe in 'em," replied the Unwiseman. "They aren't any good."
"They're splendid," said Mollie. "They're just the things to keep flowers in."
"What nonsense," said the Unwiseman, with a sneer. "The place to keep flowers is in a garden. You might just as well have a glass trunk in your parlor to hold your clothes in; or a big china bin to hold oats or grass in. It's queer how you people who know things do things. But anyhow, if I did have vases I wouldn't put 'em on mantel-pieces,but on the floor. If they are on the floor they can't fall off and break unless your house turns upside down."
"They might get stepped on," said Mollie.
"I'm fond of the wet."
"Poh!" snapped the Unwiseman. "Don't you wise people look where you step? I do, and they say I don't know enough to go in when it rains, which is not true. I know more than enough to go in when it rains. I stay out when it rains becauseI like to. I'm fond of the wet. It keeps me from drying up, and makes my clothes fit me. Why, if I hadn't stayed out in the rain every time I had a chance last summer my flannel suit never would have fitted me. It was eight sizes too big, and it took sixteen drenching storms to make it shrink small enough to be just right. Most men—wise men they call themselves—would have spent money having them misfitted again by a tailor, but I don't spend my money on things I can get done for nothing. That's the reason I don't pay anything out to beggars. I can get all the begging I want done on my place without having to pay a cent for it, and yet I know lots and lots of people who are all the time spending money on beggars."
"There is a great deal in what you say," said Mollie.
"There generally is," returned the Unwiseman. "I do a great deal of thinking,and I don't say anything without having thought it all out beforehand. That's why I'm so glad you were at home to-day. I mapped out all my conversation before I came. In fact, I wrote it all down, and then learned it by heart. It would have been very unpleasant if after doing all that, taking all that trouble, I should have found you out. It's very disappointing to learn a conversation, and then not converse it."
"I should think so," said Mollie. "What do you do on such occasions? Keep it until the next call?"
"No. Sometimes I tell it to the maid, and ask her to tell it to the person who is out. Sometimes I say it to the front door, and let the person it was intended for find it out for herself as best she can, but most generally I send it to 'em by mail."
Here the Unwiseman paused for a minute, cocking his head on one side as if to think.
"Excuse me," he said. "But I've forgotten what I was to say next. I'll have to consult my memorandum-book. Hold my umbrella a minute—over my head please. Thank you."
Then as Mollie did as the queer creature wished, he fumbled in his pockets for a minute and shortly extracting his memorandum-book from a mass of other stuff, he consulted its pages.
"Oh, yes!" he said, with a smile of happiness. "Yes, I've got it now. At this point you were to ask me if I wouldn't like a glass of lemonade, and I was to say yes, and then you were to invite me up-stairs to see your play room. There's some talk scattered in during the lemonade, but, of course, I can't go on until you've done your part."
He gazed anxiously at Mollie for a moment, and the little maid, taking the hint, smilingly said:
"Ah! won't you have a little refreshment,Mr. Me? A glass of lemonade, for instance?"
"Why—ah—certainly, Miss Whistlebinkie. Since you press me, I—ah—I don't care if I do."
And the caller and his hostess passed, laughing heartily, out of the white and gold parlor into the pantry.
"How do you like your lemonade?" asked Mollie, as she and the Unwiseman entered the pantry. "Very sour or very sweet?"
"What did you invite me to have?" the Unwiseman replied. "Lemonade or sugarade?"
"Lemonade, of course," said Mollie. "I never heard of sugarade before."
"Well, lemonade should be very lemony and sugarade should be very sugary; sowhen I am invited to have lemonade I naturally expect something very lemony, don't I?"
"I suppose so," said Mollie, meekly.
"Very well, then. That answers your question. I want it very sour. So sour that I can't drink it without it puckering my mouth up until I can't do anything but whistle like our elastic friend with the tootle in his hat."
"You mean Whistlebinkie?" said Mollie.
"Yes—that India-rubber creature who follows you around all the time and squeaks whenever any one pokes him in the ribs. What's become of him? Has he blown himself to pieces, or has he gone off to have himself made over into a golosh?"
"Oh, no—Whistlebinkie is still here," said Mollie. "In fact, he let you into the house. Didn't you see him?"
"No, indeed I didn't," said the Unwiseman. "What do you take me for? I'mproud, I am. I wouldn't look at a person who'd open a front door. I come of good family. My father was a Dunderberg and my mother was a Van Scootle. We're one of the oldest families in creation. One of my ancestors was in the Ark, and I had several who were not. It would never do for one in my position to condescend to see a person who opened a front door for pay.
"That's why I don't have servants in my own house. I'd have to speak to them, and the idea of a Dunderberg-Van Scootle engaged in any kind of conversation with servants is not to be thought of. We never did anything for pay in all the history of our family, and we never recognize as equals people who do. That's why I have nothing to do with anybody but children. Most grown up people work."
"I don't see how you live," said Mollie. "How do you pay your bills?"
"Don't have any," said the Unwiseman."Never had a bill in my life. I leave bills to canary birds and mosquitoes."
"But you have to buy things to eat, don't you?"
"Very seldom," said the Unwiseman. "I'm never hungry; but when I do get hungry I can most generally find something to eat somewhere—apples, for instance. I can live a week on one apple."
"Well, what do you do when you've eaten the apple?" queried Mollie.
"What an absurd question," laughed the Unwiseman. "Didn't you know that there was more than one apple in the world? Every year I find enough apples to last me as long as I think it is necessary to provide. Last year I laid in fifty-three apples so that if I got very hungry one week I could have two—or maybe I could give a dinner and invite my friends, and they could have the extra apple. Don't you see?"
"Well, you are queer, for a fact!" saidMollie, getting a large lemon out of the pantry closet and cutting it in half.
As the sharp steel blade of the knife cut through the crisp yellow lemon the eyes of the Unwiseman opened wide and bulged with astonishment.
"What on earth are you doing, Miss Whistlebinkie?" he said. "Why do you destroy that beautiful thing?"
It was Mollie's turn to be surprised.
"I don't know what you mean," she said. "Why shouldn't I cut the lemon? How can I make a lemonade without cutting it?"
"Humph!" said the Unwiseman, with a half sneer on his lips. "You'll go to the poor-house if you waste things like that. Why, I've had lemonade for a year out of one lemon, and it hasn't been cut open yet. I drop it in a glass of water and let it soak for ten minutes. That doesn't use up the lemon juice as your plan does, and it makes one of the bitterest sour drinks that you everdrank—however, this is your lemonade treat, and it isn't for me to criticize. My book of etiquette says that people out calling must act according to the rules of the house they are calling at. If you asked me to have some oyster soup and then made it out of sassafras or snow-balls, it would be my place to eat it and say I never tasted better oyster soup in my life. That's a funny thing about being polite. You have to do and say so many things that you don't really mean. But go ahead. Make your lemonade in your own way. I've got to like it whether I like it or not. It isn't my lemon you are wasting."
Mollie resumed the making of the lemonade while the Unwiseman looked about him, discovering something that was new and queer to him every moment. He seemed to be particularly interested in the water pipes.
"Strange idea that," he said, turning the cold water on and off all the time. "You have a little brook running through yourhouse whenever you want it. Ever get any fish out of it?"
"No," said Mollie, with a laugh. "We couldn't get very big fish through a faucet that size."
"Why don't you have larger faucets and catch the fish?"
"That's what I was thinking," said the Unwiseman, turning the water on again; "and furthermore, I think it's very strange that you don't fix it so that you can get fish. A trout isn't more than four inches around. You could get one through a six-inch pipe withoutany trouble unless he got mad and stuck his fins out. Why don't you have larger faucets and catch the fish? I would. If there aren't any fish in the brook you can stock it up without any trouble, and it would save you the money you pay to fish-markets as well as the nuisance of going fishing yourself and putting worms on hooks."
A long hilarious whistle from the pantry door caused the Unwiseman to look up sharply.
"What was that?" he said.
"Smee," came the whistling voice.
"It's Whistlebinkie," said Mollie.
"Is his real name Smee?" asked the Unwiseman. "I thought Whistlebinkie was his name."
"So it is," said Mollie. "But when he gets excited he always runs his words together and speaks them through the top of his hat. By 'smee' he meant 'it's me.' Come in, Whistlebinkie."
"I shall not notice him," said the Unwiseman, stiffly. "Remember what I said to you about my family. He opens front doors for pay."
"Donteither," whistled Whistlebinkie.
"You wrong him, Mr. Unwiseman," said Mollie. "He isn't paid for opening the front door. He just does it for fun."
"Oh! well, that's different," said the proud visitor. "If he does it just for fun I can afford to recognize him—though I must say I can't see what fun there is in opening front doors. How do you do, Whistlebinkie?"
"Pretwell," said Whistlebinkie. "How are you?"
"I hardly know what to say," replied the Unwiseman, scratching his head thoughtfully. "You see, Miss Mollie, when I got up my conversation for this call I didn't calculate on Whistlebinkie here. I haven't any remarks prepared for him. Of course, I could tell him that I am in excellent health, andthat I think possibly it will rain before the year is over; but, after all, that's very ordinary kind of talk, and we'll have to keep changing the subject all the time to get back to my original conversation with you."
"Whistlebinkie needn't talk at all," said Mollie. "He can just whistle."
"Or maybe I could go outside and put in a few remarks for him here and there, and begin the call all over again," suggested the Unwiseman.
"Oh, no! Dodoothat," began Whistlebinkie.
"Now what does he mean by dodoothat?" asked the visitor, with a puzzled look on his face.
"He means don't do that—don't you, Whistlebinkie? Answer plainly through your mouth and let your hat rest," said Mollie.
"That—swat—I—meant," said Whistlebinkie,as plainly as he could. "He—needn't—botherto—talk—toomee—to me, I mean. I only—want—to—listen—towhim."
"What's towhim?" asked the Unwiseman.
"To you is what he means. He says he's satisfied to listen to you when you talk."
"Thassit," Whistlebinkie hurried to say, meaning, I suppose, "that's it."
"Ah!" said the Unwiseman, with a pleased smile. "That's it, eh? Well, permit me to say that I think you are a very wonderfully wise rubber doll, Mr. Whistlebinkie. I may go so far as to say that in this view of the case I think you are the wisest rubber doll I ever met. You like my conversation, do you?"
"Deedido," whistled Whistlebinkie. "I think it's fine!"
"I owe you an apology, Whistlebinkie," said the Unwiseman, gazing at the doll in an affectionate way. "I thought you openedfront doors for pay, instead of which I find that you are one of the wisest, most interesting rubber celebrities of the day. I apologize for even thinking that you would accept pay for opening a front door, and I will esteem it a great favor if you will let me be your friend. Nay, more. I shall make it my first task to get up a conversation especially for you. Eh? Isn't that fine, Whistlebinkie? I, Me, the Unwiseman, promise to devote fifteen or twenty minutes of his time to getting up talk for you, talk with thinking in it, talk that amounts to something, talk that ninety-nine talkers out of a hundred conversationalists couldn't say if they tried; and all for you. Isn't that honor?"
"Welliguess!" whistled Whistlebinkie.
"Very well, then. Listen," said the Unwiseman. "Where were we at, Miss Mollie?"
"I believe," said Mollie, squeezing a half a lemon, "I believe you were saying something about putting fish through the faucet."
"Oh, yes! As I remember it, the faucets were too small to get the fish through, and I was pondering why you didn't have them larger."
"That was it," said Mollie. "You thought if the faucets were larger it would save fish-hooks and worms."
"Exactly," said the Unwiseman. "And I wonder at it yet. I'd even go farther. If I could have a trout-stream running through my house that I could turn on and off as I pleased, I'd have also an estuary connected with the Arctic regions through which whales could come, and in that way I'd save lots of money. Just think what would happen if you could turn on a faucet and get a whale. You'd get oil enough to supply every lamp in your house. You wouldn't have to pay gas bills or oil bills, and besides all that you could have whale steaks for breakfast, and whenever your mother wanted any whale-bone, instead of sending to the store for it,she'd have plenty in the house. If you only caught one whale a month, you'd have all you could possibly need."
"It certainly is a good idea," said Mollie. "But I don't think——"
"Wait a minute, please," said the Unwiseman, hastily. "That don't think remark of yours isn't due until I've turned on this other faucet."
Suiting his action to his word, the Unwiseman turned on the hot-water faucet, and plunging his hand into the water, slightly scalded his fingers.
"Ouch!" he cried; "the brook must be afire!"
"Ouch!" he cried. "The brook must be afire! Now who ever heard of that? The idea of a brook being on fire! Really, Miss Whistlebinkie, you ought to tell your papa about this. If you don't, the pipes will melt and who knows what will become of your house? It will be flooded with burning water!"
"Oh, no!—I guess not. That water is heated down stairs in the kitchen, in the boiler."
"But—but isn't it dangerous?" the Unwiseman asked, anxiously.
"Not at all," said Mollie. "You've been mistaken all along, Mr. Me. There isn't any brook running through this house."