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 "They're due to-morrow!"

The paperers were gone. The parlor really did look nice; it was worth the expense and the trouble, and the complaints about strange men in the house and the smell of paint that had gone on in Aunt Sarah's feeble old voice that always seemed about to die away, but never did, quite. Carrie had been moved into a curtained corner of the studio; Kate herself was in Carrie's little room. Her own room was ready for the children, fresh paper in bureau drawers, freshly washed curtains billowing in the windows.

"You'd a right to take a little rest," Effa told her.

"I can't, Effa. I have an awful headache, but I can't seem to keep still."

"You're nervous. I don't blame you. Looky, you sit down here and I'll make you a nice hot cup—a tea; it'll do you good."

"It would be nice. Oh, Effa! I feel so queer!"

"There! An' here's a nice piece—a cawfee cake. You didn't eat no lunch at all."

"That does make me feel better. Do you know, I think I'll send them a telegram to welcome them. I could just telephone it to the office, couldn't I? Mr. Joe wrote they'd stay over one night in New York."

So she telephoned. "Mr. J. M. Green, Jr.—oh, wait a minute, Mr. and Mrs. J. M. Green, Jr. . . . I for giraffe—no, no, I mean for jelly. M for mignonette—not minuet, mignonette. . . . Oh, well, it's the same thing. . . . I say all right, minuet. . ..