I'm not saying that New York has not had a wonderfully
Brown-Sequardesque effect on her, but I am saying that if she is to be
raised and lowered frequently, I want to travel with a portable crane."
"Hum, hum, hum!" cried Jack. "May I just ask who did most of the heavy
labor of Aunt Mary yesterday?--As the man in the opera sings twenty times
with the whole chorus to back him--''Twas I, 'twas I, 'twas I, 'twas I--'"
"Hand over the toast, Clover," said Burnett. "I don't care who it was--it
was a success anyhow, for she's upstairs and still alive, and I say she'd
enjoy coaching out Riverside way, and--" he choked.
"Slap him anywhere," said Mitchell. "On his mouth would be the proper
place. Such poor manners,--coming down to a company lunch in another man's
bath-robe and then trying to preach and eat dry toast at once."
Burnett gasped and recovered.
"There," said Clover, who had risen to administer the proposed slap, "he's
off our minds and we may again pick up Aunt Mary and put her back on."
"We want to send her home in a blaze of glory," said Jack thoughtfully. "I
want her to feel that the fun ran straight through."
"That's just what I mean," interposed his particular friend; "we want her
to go home on the wings of a giant cracker, so to speak."
"How would it do," said Clover suddenly, "to just make a night of it and
take her along? Stock up, stack up, and ho! for it. You all know the kind
of a time I mean."
"Clover," said Jack gravely, "does it occur to you that Aunt Mary belongs
to me and that I have a personal interest in keeping her alive?"
"Nothing ever occurs to him," said Mitchell.
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