"What does he mean?" Aunt Mary asked.

"He's referring to his own affairs," said Burnett; "come on-let's get coffee now!"

They all adjourned to a tiny room lined with posters and decorated with pipe racks, and there had ice cream in the form of bulls and bears, and coffee of the strongest variety. And then cordials and cigarettes.

"Now, where shall we go to first?" asked Burnett when all were well lit up. No one would have guessed that he had ever felt used up in all his life before.

"To a roof garden," said Mitch.e.l.l. "We'll go to a roof garden first, and then we'll go to more roof gardens, and after that if the spirit moves we'll go to yet a few roof gardens in addition. We'll show our dear aunt what wonders can be done with roofs, and to-morrow she'll wonder what was done with her."

"That's the bill," said Clover, "and let's go now. I can see from the general manner of my mouse that he's dying to get out and make his way in the wide world."

"Mine the same," said Mitch.e.l.l; "by George, it worries me to see such restless, feverish manners in what I had supposed would be a quiet domestic companion. It presages a distracted existence. But come on."

They all rose.

"Where are we goin' now?" asked Aunt Mary.

"To a roof garden," said Jack, "and we're going to take the whole menagerie, Aunt Mary. We're going to get put in the papers. That's the great stunt,-to get put in the papers."

"But we'll leave the megaphones," said Mitch.e.l.l. "I won't go about with a mouse and a megaphone. People might think I looked silly. People are so queer."

"Put the mouse in the megaphone," suggested Burnett. "That's the way my mother taught me to pack when I was a kid. You put your tooth brush in a shoe, and the shoe in a sleeve and then turn the sleeve inside out. Oh, I tell you-what is home without a mother?-Put the mouse in the megaphone and stop up both ends. What are your hands and your mouth for?"

"Yes," said Mitch.e.l.l, "I think I see myself so handling a megaphone that the mouse doesn't run out either end or into my mouth. My mouth is a good mouth and it's served me well and I won't turn it over to a mouse at this late day."

"Let's keep the mice in their cages," said Clover, and as he spoke he dropped his.

"Now see what you've done!" said the parrot.

"I didn't hurt it," said Clover. "Come on now."

"Yes, come on," said Burnett. "It's long after ten o'clock. You want to remember that even roof gardens are not eternally on tap."

"Well, I'm trying to hurry all I can," said Mitch.e.l.l. "I'm the picture of patience scurrying for dear life only unable to lay hands on her gloves."

"I don't catch what's the trouble," said Aunt Mary to Jack.

[Ill.u.s.tration 5]

"The carriage stopped three hundred feet below the level of a roof-garden."

"Nothing's the trouble," said Jack, "everything's fine and dandy. We're going out now. Time of your life, Aunt Mary, time of your life!"

They telephoned for a carriage and all got in. Then Clover slammed the door.

"Now see what you've done!" said the parrot.

"Is he going to keep saying that?" Burnett asked.

"I don't know," said Jack. "It comes in pretty pat, don't it?"

"Makes me think of my mother," said Clover. "I wish it wouldn't."

"I don't catch who's sayin' what," said Aunt Mary.

"n.o.body's saying anything, Miss Watkins," roared Mitch.e.l.l; "we are all talking airy nothings just to pa.s.s the time o' day."

The carriage stopped three hundred feet below the level of a roof garden.

"We get out here," said Burnett.

They all got out and went up in an elevator.

"Seems to be a good many goin' to the same place," said Aunt Mary.

"Yes," said Mitch.e.l.l, "a good many people generally go to places that are great places for a good many people to go to."

"You ought not to end with a preposition," said Clover.

"There, I left my ear-trumpet in the carriage!" said Aunt Mary.

There was a pause of consternation. No one spoke except the parrot.

"We know what she's done without your telling us," said Clover, addressing the bird. "The question is what to do next?"

Jack went back downstairs and found the carriage waiting in hopes of picking up another load. He lost no time in personally picking up the ear-trumpet and returning to his friends.

Then they all proceeded above and bought a table and turned their chairs to the stage, where the attraction just at that moment was a quartette of pretty girls.

"I'll tell you what we'll do," said Burnett the instant the girls began to sing. "Let's each tie a card to a mouse and present them to the girls!"

The suggestion found favor and was followed out to the letter. But when the girls were through and the Chinaman who followed them on the programme was also over, the pleasures of life in that spot palled upon the party.

"Oh, come," said Burnett, "let's go somewhere else. Let's go out in the air."

His suggestion found favor. And they sallied forth and visited another roof garden, a theater where they saw the last quarter of the fourth act, a place where Aunt Mary was given a gondola ride, and a place where she was given something in the shape of light refreshments.

Then, becoming thirsty, they ordered a few White Horses and Red Horses and the Necks of yet other horses, but Aunt Mary declined the horses of all colors and Mitch.e.l.l upheld her.

"That's right," he said, "I'm a great believer in knowing when you've had enough, and I'm sure you've all had so much too much that I know that I must have had enough and that she's better off with none at all."

"I reckon you're right," said Clover. "I've had enough, surely. I can't see over my pile of little saucers, and when I can't see over my pile of little saucers I'm always positive that I've had enough."

Jack laughed and then ceased laughing and drew down the corners of his mouth.

"Why do people sit on chairs?" Clover asked just then. "Why don't everyone sit on the floor? You never feel as if you might slip off the floor."

"Ah," said Mitch.e.l.l, "if we were not always trying to rise above Nature we should all be sitting where Nature intended,-when we weren't swinging by our tails and picking cocoanuts."