One morning a few days after the dress-up fun Aunt Effie had to go down town on some errands and Mary Jane was left to play by herself. She and her auntie had grown to be such good play fellows that it was hard to find something interesting to do without Aunt Effie to join in the fun.

"Why don't you find something to do and then do it?" said Mrs. Merrill after Mary Jane had made pictures on the window pane and rummaged through the mending basket and poked her finger into the canary's cage and fingered the forbidden little green balls on the ends of the fern leaves. "Little girls can't expect to have a good time when they do all the things they are not allowed to do. Go and play with Marie Georgiannamore, you haven't played with her since Aunt Effie came."

"Will you play too?" asked Mary Jane.

"Not for a while yet, dear," replied mother, "because this is wash morning and I have a new laundress to look after. Didn't you see her come around the house when we were at breakfast? I have to go downstairs and show her how we like our clothes washed and starched. Don't you want to go along?"

"Oh, yes, mother, I do!" cried Mary Jane happily. "I want to learn to wash, too." Then she thought a minute. "But I believe I'd better take Marie Georgiannamore along too—she's lonesome."

"I'm sure she is," answered Mrs. Merrill. "You run along and get her and then we'll go to the laundry."

Mary Jane hurried upstairs for her big doll, but, though she searched every place that a big doll ought to be, not a sign of Marie Georgiannamore could she see.

"Mother!" called Mary Jane over the front stair railing, "Marie
Georgiannamore's lost!"

"Lost—no, surely not," said Mrs. Merrill and she started up the stairs to hunt for the misplaced dolly. "Oh, I remember now, dear," she added when she was half way up, "Aunt Effie took her clothes off to wash them and I expect the dolly is some place in her room. Get your biggest kewpie and come on, I can't wait too long."

Now Kewpie, the biggest kewpie, was the doll with the broad smile who slept with Mary Jane every night. Other dolls got their hair mussed or their clothes untidied or something; but Kewpie could always be depended on to be neat and smiling no matter where he slept or what happened to him—a most satisfactory doll to take to bed as you can see. Mary Jane ran into her room to get him but her bed was all neatly made and Kewpie was nowhere to be seen.

"Kewpie's lost too," called Mary Jane.

"No, he isn't," laughed mother, who by that time was at the bottom of the stairs, "he must be right there, you had him in bed last night, you know."

Mary Jane ran back and poked her hand under the pillow; looked under the bed; on the dresser and on the window seat. No Kewpie was to be found.

"You'll find him in a minute," Mrs. Merrill called up the stairs, "and then you come down and meet me—I'll be looking for you, dear." And then she hurried on to her waiting duties.

Mary Jane hunted and hunted but she didn't find Kewpie. She did find her rag doll tucked back in the far corner of the closet and she began playing with her and forgot all about Kewpie and the new laundress and even about her own lonesomeness with Aunt Effie away. She had such a good time dressing the rag doll in new clothes and going visiting with her and all that, that she didn't notice mother when she twice peeped into the door to see if her little girl was safe and happy. First thing Mary Jane knew, it was lunch time—you know how quickly the clock does run round and round when you are having a good time.

Now on wash day the Merrills didn't have their lunch on the dining table as they did on other days; no, because they liked to do different things and wash day is a very good day to be different. On that day Mrs. Merrill fixed a tempting little tray for each person and left all the trays on the kitchen table. Then each person as he or she came home, father and Alice and Aunt Effie (and of course mother and Mary Jane who were already at home, had trays too), went into the kitchen and got his or her own tray—the trays could be told apart by the napkin rings marked with initials—and carried it into the living room and sat down in a comfortable chair and ate lunch. And afterwards, each person carried his or her own tray back to the kitchen table. They thought that way of eating lunch was lots of fun and Mary Jane well remembered how big and important she felt the first day mother allowed her to carry her own tray (with the glass of milk on mother's tray for safe keeping, of course) and to hold it on her own lap like big folks instead of sitting up to the piano bench like a baby! Mary Jane felt bigger that day than she ever had in all her life.

Just as she had picked up her tray and was going out of the kitchen on this particular noon, the new laundress came up from the laundry. Of course that wasn't so very unusual for Mary Jane often met the laundress in the kitchen at noon time, but it was unusual to have the laundress step up and lay something on her tray. Mary Jane had to hold tight to keep from spilling something she was so surprised!

"I guess this must be yours, little girl," the laundress said, "I found it in one of the sheets." And Mary Jane looked and saw her Kewpie that she had hunted so hard to find.

"Oh, that must be my fault!" exclaimed mother. "I gathered the sheets up in such a hurry this morning that I quite forgot to look for Kewpie—I'm sorry!"

Mary Jane looked up at the kindly face of the new laundress, "Thank you so much," she said, "and I'm coming down to see you after I have eaten my lunch."

So as soon as she had lunched and had carried her tray back to the kitchen table, she hurried downstairs to the laundry. That new laundress seemed to know a great deal about little girls and to like them for she answered all Mary Jane's questions and told stories and didn't seem to be bothered a bit by having a little guest.

"There!" she said finally, "I'm ready to hang out. Do you want to come along to the yard and hold the clothes pins?"

"I'll come pretty soon," said Mary Jane, and then she added importantly, "I have something I want to do first."

"Come along then, when you're through," answered the laundress unsuspiciously, and she picked up the heavy basket and went out of doors.

Left alone, Mary Jane slipped over to the wringer—that was the one thing above all others in the laundry that interested her and she did want to see how it worked. She turned the handle slowly three or four times, watching the cogs as she did so to see how they fit into each other so neatly and then so quickly slipped out again.

"I do think that's funny," she said thoughtfully; "there must be something in there that makes them act so, I guess I'd better see what it is." And slowly turning the handle with one hand, she stuck an inquiring finger in between the cogs.

Of the few minutes that followed, Mary Jane never had a very good idea. She knew she must have screamed with the pain of a hurt finger because the laundress rushed in from the yard, mother came from upstairs and in a few minutes Aunt Effie hurried breathlessly down the stairs. Then, before long, the doctor was there too, and her finger was all tied up with sticks on each side and father hurried in the front door and asked her how she'd like a nice, long, Christmasy stick of candy. It all happened just that quick.

"I think things is so funny," said Mary Jane later as she luxuriously licked her candy. "If Marie Georgiannamore hadn't hid and if Kewpie hadn't gone to the washing and if I hadn't wondered about that wringer thing, I wouldn't have had this candy that I've wanted for—for ninety-seven days."

"Yes," agreed the doctor as he went out of the door, "things is funny. And my advice to you, young lady, is this; next time you want to see how a wringer works, ask before you investigate. Another time you might lose, instead of bruise, your finger."

"I will," nodded Mary Jane, "only I don't want to know how it works any more—I know enough now, I do."