Come Out of the Kitchen! Part 20

"Oh, really?" he stammered. "I had an idea that we had eaten quite a lot of it."

"No," returned Mrs. Falkener firmly, "no, a good dish went down. Let us go and see."

Crane glanced at Jane-Ellen. He thought she had overheard.

They reached the ice-box; the cook lifted the lid, and Mrs. Falkener looked in. The first sight that greeted her eyes was the platter that had borne the salad she had liked so much. It was almost empty.

"Why, Jane-Ellen," she said, "where is all the rest of that excellent salad?"

At this question, Jane-Ellen, who was standing beside the chest, gave the lid a slight downward impulsion, so that it suddenly closed with a loud, heavy report, within half an inch of Mrs. Falkener's nose.

That lady turned to Burton.

"Burton," she said, with the majesty of which she was at times capable, "I leave it to you to decide whether or not this impossible young woman did that on purpose," and so saying she swept away up the stairs, like a G.o.ddess reascending Olympus.

"Look here, Jane-Ellen," said Crane, "I don't stand for that."

"Oh, sir," replied the culprit, with a return to an earlier manner, "you surely don't think I had anything to do with it?"

"Unhappily, I was watching your hand at the time, and I know that you had."

Jane-Ellen completely changed her method.

"Oh, well," she said, "you did not want her going on any more about the old salad, did you?"

"I don't want the end of my guest's nose taken off."

"It's rather a long nose," said the cook dispa.s.sionately.

"Jane-Ellen, I am seriously displeased."

At this the cook had a new idea. She extracted a very small handkerchief from her pocket and unfolded it as she said:

"Yes, indeed, sir, I suppose I did utterly forget my place, but it's rather hard on a poor girl--one day you treat her as if she were an empress, and the next, just as if she were mud under your feet." She pressed the handkerchief to her eyes.

"Jane-Ellen, you know I never treated you like mud under my feet."

"It was only last night in my brother's room," she went on tearfully, "that you scolded me for not being candid, and now at the very first candid thing I do, you turn on me like a lion--"

At this point Crane removed her hands and handkerchief from before her face, and revealed the fact, which he already suspected, that she was smiling all the time.

"Jane-Ellen, what a dreadful fraud you are!" he said quite seriously.

"No, Mr. Crane," answered Jane-Ellen, briskly tucking away her handkerchief, now that its usefulness was over. "No, I'm not exactly a fraud. It's just that that's my way of enjoying myself, and you know, sometimes I think other people enjoy it, too."

"Do you think Mrs. Falkener enjoys it?"

"I wasn't thinking of Mrs. Falkener," replied Jane-Ellen, with a twinkle in her eyes.

"Burton!" called Mrs. Falkener's voice from the head of the stairs.

Crane and his cook drew slightly closer together, as if against a common enemy.

"Do you suppose she can have heard us?" he asked.

"I think she's perfectly capable of trying to hear."

Crane smiled.

"I took a great risk, Jane-Ellen, when I advised you to be candid."

"Burton!" said the voice again.

"Merciful powers!" exclaimed Crane. "She calls like Juliet's nurse."

The cook laughed.

"But you must be prompter than Juliet was."

"What do you know about Shakespeare, Jane-Ellen?"

"Moving pictures have been a great education to the lower cla.s.ses, you know, sir."

He moved toward the stairs, but turned back to say,

"Good-by, Jane-Ellen."

She answered:

"'Think you that we shall ever meet again?'" and then even she seemed to feel that she had committed an imprudence and she dashed away to the kitchen.

Crane ascended the stairs slowly, for he was trying to recall the lines that follow Juliet's pathetic question, when he suddenly became aware of Mrs. Falkener's feet planted firmly on the top step, and then of that lady's whole majestic presence. He pulled himself together with an effort.

"Do you suppose that girl could have dropped that lid on purpose?" he asked, as if this were the question he had been so deeply pondering.

"I feel not the least doubt of it," returned Mrs. Falkener.

He shook his head.

"It seems almost incredible," he answered, moving swiftly across the hall toward the sitting-room, where Tucker and Miss Falkener were visible.

"On the contrary," replied the elder lady, "it seems to me perfectly in keeping with the whole conduct of this extraordinary young person." They had now entered the room, and she included Tucker and her daughter in an account of the incident.

"You know, Solon, and you, too, Cora, how easy I am on servants. I must admit, every one will confirm it, that my own servants adore me. They adore me, don't they, Cora? No wonder. I see to their comfort. They have their own bath, and a sitting-room far better than anything I had myself as a young woman. But in return I do demand respect, absolute respect.

And when I am looking into an ice-box, examining it, at Burton's special request, to have that young minx slam down the lid, almost catching my nose, Solon, I a.s.sure you, almost touching my nose, as she did it!"

Tucker listened attentively, tapping his eye-gla.s.ses on his left palm.

Then he said: