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Warner, Anne, 1869-1913

"The Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary"


"Why didn't you tell me what it was made of?" she asked in annoyance. "I
feel just as if I'd swallowed a marsh--a green one!"
"That's a shame!" said Clover indignantly. "I'll get you something that
will take that taste out of your mouth double quick. Here!" he called to a
waiter, and then he gave the man certain careful directions.
The latter nodded wisely, and a few minutes later brought in a tiny glass
containing a pousse-cafe in three different colors.
"It's a cocktail. Drink it quick," Clover directed.
Aunt Mary demurred.
"I never drank a cocktail," she began.
"No time like the present to begin," said Clover, "you'll have to learn
some day."
"Cocktails," said Mitchell, "are the advance guard of a newer and brighter
civilization. They--"
"If she's going to take it at all she must take it now," said Clover
authoritatively. "The green and the yellow are beginning to run together.
Quick now!"
His confiding guest drank quick and became the three different colors
quicker yet.
"What's the matter?" Jack asked anxiously.
Aunt Mary was speechless.
"He mixed it wrong," said Clover in a sad, discouraged tone. "What she
ought to have got first she got last, that's all. The cocktail is upside
down inside of her, and the effect of it is upside down on the outside of
her."
"Feel any better now, Aunt Mary?" Jack yelled.
"I can't seem to keep the purple swallowed," said the poor old lady. "I
want to go home. I've always been a great believer in going home when you
feel like I do now.


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