"Reckon you'd have wanted a lump of sugar after it, Topknot."

The good-natured housekeeper shook with laughter as she listened to these remarks from the next room.

"What a terrible creature this _Miss Fixfix_ is!" thought she. "Well, if they've got such an idea of me, I won't try to change it. Not for the rest of the day, at any rate. I'll keep my distance, and let 'em work."

Mother Hubbard began to look about her with the mien of a housekeeper.

"Let us see: what are we burning here?" said she, taking off a stove-cover. "Wood, I declare. Mrs. Fixfax is afraid I couldn't manage coal!"

"And here's a 'normous big box full of sticks," said Lady Magnifico. "I didn't s'pose wood grew in New York. What now, Mr. Moon? Don't I know wood is sawed out of trees? Well, what you laughing at, then?"

"Laughing, my lady? Why, who can help it, to see such a jolly room, big enough to hold a ma.s.s-meeting? That's a loud-spoken clock up there.

Wonder if Mother Hubbard notices it's just going to strike twelve?"

Prudy looked up, but did not take the hint.

"I'm so glad I remembered to bring that clock. I always used to tell my dog I prized it as much as he did his dear little tail.--Why, what's burning? That child has scorched her slip. Do take care of her, Mr.--what may I call you?--while I look over this cupboard."

"Call me Dr. Moonshine, if you want to."

"I'm glad I was so thoughtful as to order sugar," continued the landlady. "It's excellent to drop medicine on. What's this in a bowl?

Ice-cream?"

"Why, don't you know what that is?" said Lady Magnifico, sweeping along to the cupboard, and dipping in her dainty finger; "that's _condemned milk_.'

"_Condensed_ milk, her ladyship means," said the doctor, "boiled down, you know, and thickened. When you make a custard for dinner, you'll have to put in a tea-kettle full of water."

This was the second hint the young man had thrown out concerning dinner; but Prudy was not to be hurried.

"What's this in a little caddy? O, it's rice. No; it's what Dotty used to call _c.o.ker whacker_."

"What does she call it now, may I ask?" said the doctor, with an irritating smile.

"_Patti-c.o.ker_--what you s'pose?" was the rash reply. Poor Lady Magnifico! Little tingles of shame ran down her fingers as soon as she had spoken, for she saw, by the glances between her landlady and the doctor, that she had made another mistake.

"O, I like to keep house," cried Fly, holding up her trailing robes, and dancing over a carpet seam. "What's this goldy thing?"

"Bellows, Toddlekins, to blow up the fire. See me fill out their leather cheeks."

"What pretty little _blozers_! Let me blow 'em!"

There was a second dash upon the stove, and another scorch in the slip.

"There ought to be a fence built round that stove," said the anxious father.

"Come, Mother Hubbard, have you seen all there is in the cupboard?

Can't you give this poor old dog a bone?"

"Well, here I am with the care of the family on my shoulders," thought Mother Hubbard, winking fast behind the green spectacles, and recalling uneasily the couplet her father often repeated:--

"Think well before you pursue it; But when you begin, go through it."

"Now what'll we have for dinner?"

Lady Magnifico was walking languidly about, admiring herself in the mirror, Dr. Moonshine rummaging an old closet, and Baby pulling out the bureau drawers.

"They have the easy part. But never mind; I'll show them what I can do.

Mother says I have a great deal more taste for cooking than Susy has.

Didn't I make pickles all one vacation?"

Then Prudy sat down with the "Housekeeper's Friend," and began at the first page to read. Half an hour pa.s.sed, and no signs of her moving.

"I'm hunger-y," whispered Baby, taking a sugar-coated pill out of a box, and touching it with her tongue. It was sweet till her teeth went into it, when out rolled the little ball upon the floor.

"O, my shole! How bitter!" groaned she, wiping her mouth on a lace cuff.

"'Spect that's a pill, and they cooked it in sugar; but I shan't eat it."

"Little daughter, what are you doing there? Mustn't meddle with other folks' things." Dr. Moonshine sneezed as he spoke, having breathed some of the "dust of ages" into his nose off a top shelf, where Mrs. Fixfax kept a few herbs. Ten minutes more. The doctor stepped down from the chair-back on which he had been standing, and gazed hard at his landlady. She was turning the sixteenth page.

"My Lady Magnifico!"

"Sir?"

"My lady, do you happen to have such a thing as a peanut in your pocket?"

My lady shook the cat out of the armchair, and seated herself.

"It isn't polite to carry round peanuts."

"I was only thinking," continued the doctor, with a side glance at Mother Hubbard, "how nice a peanut would be to keep anybody from fainting away."

Mother Hubbard started from her chair. "What unfashionable boarders! You don't expect dinner in the middle of the day, I hope! In the city of New York we don't have it till five or six o'clock. I'm afraid you came down too soon, Dr. Moonshine."

"Afraid I did. Wish I was 'the man in the South.' I'd like to 'burn my mouth' on a little 'cold plum porridge.'"

"Haven't any for you; but I'll give you a lunch. What say to omelettes and coffee?"

"Excellent," said Dr. Moonshine, reviving.

"Exquisite," drawled my lady.

"_Exquit_," quoth Fly.

"Only there isn't any coffee," said Mother Hubbard, going to the cupboard.

"Call it tea," said the doctor, "and hurry up."

"No, chocolate is better. How do you make chocolate?" said the landlady, turning to her cook-book.