Page:Biggers and Ritchie - Inside the Lines.djvu/122

 Peace at the Hague before the war broke out. Guess they're leasing it for a skating rink now, though."

"How can you joke when we're in such a fix? He-Henry, you ne-never do take things seriously!"

"Why not joke, mother? Only thing you can do over here you don't have to pay for. Cheer up! There's the Saxonia due here from Naples some time soon. Maybe we can horn a way up her gangplank. Consul says"

Mrs. Sherman looked up from her handkerchief with withering scorn.

"Tell me a way we can get aboard any ship without having the money to pay our passage. Tell me that, Henry Sherman!"

"Well, we've been broke before, mother," her spouse answered cheerily, rocking himself on heels and toes. "Remember when we were first married and had that little house on Liberty Street—the newest house in Kewanee it was; and we didn't have a hired girl, then, mother. But we come out all right, didn't we?" He patted his daughter's shoulder and winked ponderously. "Come on, girls and boys, we'll go look over those Rock Chambers