Mrs. Hudson is going, and, oh dear! we can’t afford it. It is all Ernie’s fault, too. How could she have been so careless!

This is the way it happened. We have had a visit from Mrs. Bo-gardus! No one would have believed it possible; no one really, I suppose, except Miss Brown and Robin, entirely believed there was any “sich a person.” But to-day her existence was proven to us. Let me begin at the beginning and explain.

Mrs. Hudson has been with us six months now, renting the second-story alcove room; and during all that time, whether the beefsteak was tough or the house cold, she has never personally complained. It has been rather,—

“My friend Mrs. Bo-gardus simply couldn’t endure such a draught as this. It would give her pneumonia directly. She is a very sensitive woman;—what I call a true blood aristocrat.”

“Is she indeed?” Miss Brown would murmur, antiphonically responsive. Miss Brown is meek, and meagre, and easily impressed.

“Yes,” Mrs. Hudson would continue, swelling visibly under the arrested attention of the entire dinner table (for everybody listens when Mrs. Hudson talks):—“That is what I should certainly call her. Now a soup such as we are eating this evening simply wouldn’t sit on Mrs. Bo-gardus’s stummick. It is too thick.”

“Her stummick is too thick?” queries Mr. Hancock, anxiously. He is a dyspeptic, himself, and very much interested in anything pertaining to symptoms or dietetics.

“Not at all,” answers Mrs. Hudson, slightly ruffled at the misapprehension. “The soup is too thick.”

Whereupon Mr. Hancock, who has been eating quite comfortably up to the present moment, takes to stirring round and round his plate with reproachful sweeps of the spoon, till his wife inquires soothingly,—

“Don’t you think we might try some of that Glucose Bread we saw advertised, Ducky? I’m sure Mrs. Graham would get it for you.”

The Hancocks are young, and recently married. He is a bank clerk with poppy eyes; she is small, and plump, and pretty. They are “Ducky” and “Dovie” to each other,—but they are really nice and considerate, so one feels rather shabby to poke fun.

However, to return to Mrs. Bo-gardus. It was not only what she could not eat. She had a great many opinions as well, especially as to how people “in reduced circumstances” should live.

“Mrs. Bo-gardus thinks that if you can only afford one servant you should certainly engage two, for there is nothing that pays so well as style.”

She also “thought” a great many other things,—I can’t pause to relate them here,—and no matter how patently absurd her opinions might be, they were reported as such Delphic utterances that no one dreamed of questioning them.

Every fortnight or so Mrs. Hudson has been in the habit of paying Mrs. Bo-gardus a call. One always learned at the breakfast table when one of these visits was about to take place, for Mrs. Hudson dressed for them upon rising, no matter what time of day she may have planned to start, in a purple velvet walking-suit, with white linen collar and cuffs, and a very much crimped blond false front. Her own hair is decidedly gray. When she goes to church, or shopping with Miss Brown, or even to the theatre, this answers. It is only for Mrs. Bo-gardus the blond crimps appear.

Naturally this morning when Mrs. Hudson descended upon us “in full panoply of war-paint,” as Haze expressed it, we supposed she must be going to pay one of her ceremonial visits. Both mother and I felt relieved, for the house continued cold despite all our efforts; but we made no remark, and Mrs. Hudson volunteered no information till Rose appeared, rather untidy as to dress and apron, bearing a plate of slightly burned biscuits. Then it began.

“Mrs. Bo-gardus’s establishment consists of three maids and an imported butler. His name is Samuels,—with an s, if you please, Miss Brown. One can judge from that fact alone of the style to which she is accustomed.”

“Yes, indeed,” murmured Miss Brown.

“Now, anything like this,” continued Mrs. Hudson, helping herself to a biscuit and weighing it accusingly on extended palm, “simply wouldn’t sit on Mrs. Bo-gardus’s stummick. She is used to lunching at Sherry’s or the Waldorf, every day, if she pleases. However, I have warned her she must expect to find things different here. She is fully prepared; for I explained everything when I issued my invitation.”

“Mrs. Bo-gardus! here!” exclaimed mother, setting down the cream jug with undue suddenness; while Mr. Hancock, who had been morosely weighing his biscuit in servile imitation of Mrs. Hudson, dropped it into his coffee cup, and stared with popping eyes.

“Yes,” returned Mrs. Hudson, evidently very well satisfied with the impression she was producing. “Haven’t I mentioned that I am expecting a visit from Mrs. Bo-gardus to-day? She is coming to lunch with me. It seemed about time I should repay some of her hospitality. I hope my little plan in no way inconveniences any one?”

Haze kicked me under the table. Ernie wriggled ecstatically. Robin sighed, and opened wide, shining eyes; while poor Miss Brown murmured feebly,—

“Mrs. Hudson! Mrs. Bo-gardus! oh really!”

Mother was the first to regain her composure.

“We will be very glad to meet any friend of yours, Mrs. Hudson,” she said; “but I am sorry you did not tell me before. It would have been easier to make arrangements.”

“Certainly, I intended to do so,” observed Mrs. Hudson. “But the fact is, the matter slipped my mind.”

We looked at one another in open admiration. Could human cheek be carried further? Mrs. Bo-gardus was coming to luncheon, and the fact had slipped Mrs. Hudson’s mind!

Gradually the boarders faded from the room, leaving us to a hurried family council. It was Monday; there was cold roast left over from yesterday’s dinner, and a washerwoman in the kitchen. Yet, strangely enough, no one thought of rebellion or complaint.

“Mrs. Bo-gardus,” murmured Haze, in a voice as nearly like Miss Brown’s as he could make it, “Mrs. Bo-gardus, you know, is coming to lunch!”

And then, for no earthly assignable reason, we dropped into various receptacles along the way and melted and sobbed with mirth. Robin caught his knees in both arms and rolled over and over on the rug, a corner of the tablecloth stuffed in his mouth. Ernie began to caper and frisk madly about, hugging the bewildered and rebellious kitten. I sank helpless on the window-seat, and hid my face among the curtains.

“Shut the door, Hazard,” gasped mother, as soon as she was able to articulate. “They mustn’t hear us!”

At which the gale began afresh. Somehow the situation struck us as irresistibly funny.

“Well,” chuckled Hazard, weakly at last, “there’s no lark here for me. I shan’t meet her. I’ll be away at school.”

“And I have a holiday to-day and to-morrow, because they are repairing the furnaces! How jolly!” cried Ernie.

“Will she come in a hansom?” piped Robin, “or by fairy?”

He meant the ferry; and these two modes of conveyance are the most elegant known to his youthful experience.

parodied Haze.

“And driven by Samuels,—with an s, if you please, Miss Brown,” mocked Ernie, wickedly.

“Children! children!” warned mother. “We must be serious. It is Mrs. Bo-gardus, you know;—and I had planned cold veal for luncheon!”

“Not even chicken?” pleaded Ernestine.

The situation as one faced it loomed portentous. The psychic power of that Name was not to be lightly evaded.

“Well,” said mother, at last, with a little sigh, “we must do the best we can. Elizabeth will help me in the kitchen, Rose is never the least good of a Monday, and Ernestine can dress Robin and superintend the setting of the table. Let me see, there will be six, seven, of us,—eliminating Haze and Mr. Hancock, who fortunately do not lunch at home. I like an even table so much better.”

“Let me wait then, mother dear,” volunteered Ernie. “The way I do Sunday evenings when Rose is out. You know she never does serve things properly.”

“You would not mind?” asked mother.

“No, indeed; not a bit,” answered Ernie, frankly. “Everybody will know I am your daughter, just the same, and I think it is rather fun.”

So it was arranged. The menu took a little longer to plan; and with cooking, dusting, and dressing, the morning flew swiftly by. One might have supposed we were preparing for a royal visit.

Eleven o’clock struck,—half-past eleven. Robin and Ernie in their pretty blue sailor-suits flashed down to the kitchen for inspection.

“Will she be here soon?” pranced Robin. His eyes were bright as stars, his cheeks as pink as roses.

“I think so,” answered mother. “Run up to the nursery now, where you can watch from the window.”

At quarter to twelve precisely there sounded the clatter of horses’ feet upon the asphalt. Shall I confess it? Interrupting a hasty toilet I ran to the window, too, and peeped out like any child.

A hansom-cab, as Robin had predicted, was drawn up before our door. From it stepped a middle-aged lady. She was tall, somewhat spare, attired in conventional black. From the distance at which I surveyed her she looked a little, just a little, like—Miss Brown! She mounted the steps and rang the bell.

The excitement died from my brain. A chill feeling of disappointment crept over me. Was this the phoenix? this the invisible mentor under whose dicta our household had trembled for so many months? A minute later the sound of subdued greeting floated up from the hall below.

“How do you do, Mrs. Hudson?”

“How do you do, Mrs. Bo-gardus?”

I went into the nursery to capture Robin and give his locks one final dab before lunch should be announced.

“She’s just like anybody else,” he mourned, lifting a tear-stained face from where it had been buried in his arm against the window sill.

“Well, dearest, what did you expect?” I asked, with an absurd inflection of sympathetic woe.

“I don’t know,” admitted Bobsie, “but, somehow, I thought—she would be different.”

Then the bell rang, and we hastened downstairs.

In the dining-room the presentations were being made.

“Mrs. Graham, allow me the Honour of Presenting my friend Mrs. Bo-gardus; Mrs. Bo-gardus, Mrs. Graham.—— Miss Brown, allow me to Present my friend Mrs. Bo-gardus; Mrs. Bo-gardus, Miss Brown.—— Mrs. Hancock, allow me the Honour of Presenting my friend Mrs. Bo-gardus; etc.——”

Immediately our spirits rose. It was an Occasion, after all. Mrs. Hudson felt it, I felt it, Robin felt it. He put out his little hand quite prettily when his turn came.

“So this is the lame boy?” remarked Mrs. Bo-gardus, in a stiff falsetto.

“No,” protested Robin (I don’t think he had ever been called lame, before), “I just hop a little, because sometimes my side aches.”

“It is the same thing, my dear,” explained Mrs. Hudson. “Mrs. Bo-gardus knows all about such matters. She sits on two hospitals boards, and is Secretary of the Free Kindergarten Association.”

“Indeed!” murmured Miss Brown.

With Mrs. Hudson as expositor, and Miss Brown as chorus, Mrs. Bo-gardus’s glory could not wane. She shone upon us, enigmatic, sphinx-like, throughout a somewhat oppressive meal. No one but Mrs. Hudson ventured to mingle in the conversation. Indeed, it was not necessary. Ernie waited very prettily; the croquettes were silently engulfed, likewise the custards. And, despite Mrs. Bo-gardus’s sensitive “stummick,” we were encouraged to believe that they would sit.

“My dear, will you play for us?” Mrs. Hudson asked after lunch. “Mrs. Bo-gardus is very fond of music.” It was rather a royal command than a request, but without an e string what could one do?

“Then perhaps your little brother will recite?” persisted Mrs. Hudson.

“What shall I say, Elizabeth?” asked Robin, obligingly.

“Suppose you say ‘My Shadow,’” I suggested.

So Bobsie, flushed and honoured, standing on the worn Bokhara rug, began:—

The ladies sat about the parlour, their hands folded in their laps, Mrs. Bo-gardus with her head a little to one side as if listening for a false note, Mrs. Hudson pompously responsible, Miss Brown meekly appreciative.

piped Robin in his pretty treble.

Mrs. Bo-gardus’s head tilted just a little to the left.

“Shoots?” queried Mrs. Hudson. “Are you sure of that word Shoots?”

Robin paused, and looked doubtfully at me.

“Yes,” I answered. “Shoots is right.”

continued Robin.

Mrs. Bo-gardus’s head again cocked towards the left, and a slightly pained expression gathered between her brows.

“Isn’t it plant, my dear?” corrected Mrs. Hudson. “Since the first word is shoots it certainly must be an india-rubber plant?”

“No,” I said, “ball is right.”

persisted Robin, bravely.

Mrs. Bo-gardus pursed her lips.

“Well, well,” concluded Mrs. Hudson, hurriedly. “This is a very pretty piece, no doubt, and we are much obliged; but Mrs. Bo-gardus can’t sit here all the afternoon listening to one little boy recite, when she might hear twenty any day she pleased, all with kindergarten training, too! There are some photographs we have planned to look over upstairs, so if you will excuse us——” And the two ladies, rising with majestic accord, swept from the room.

It was rather dampening, to be sure, but Bobsie bore it well. Only his lower lip trembled a little as he asked,—

“It couldn’t have been a rubber-plant, now could it, Ellie?” That is his pet name for me. He uses it when he stands in need of comfort.

“No, honey,” I answered. “It certainly couldn’t.”

When just at that moment there was a crash, and a hurtle, and a smothered squeal in the hall outside, and we all ran out to see what could be happening.

I shall never forget it. Down the stairway from the second story, step after step, with a little bump on each, coasted Ernie. Her feet were stuck out straight before her, her arms were aloft, in one hand she bore a pitcher of ice-water, in the other a tumbler, while mother’s old silver serving tray rattled and rolled ahead. The poor child’s mouth was open, and every few steps she would emit a deprecating little squeak, as if to say:—

“I know I ought not to be tumbling downstairs. But what are you going to do about it?”

Mrs. Hudson and Mrs. Bo-gardus, who had started to go up in search of the photographs, stood midway of the flight, directly in the path of danger.

“Ernie! Oh, Ernie!” I cried. “Look out! Look out for Mrs. Bo-gardus!”

“I c-c-c-can’t!” gurgled Ernie. “Let her g-get——”

And then there was a second crash, and a splash, and a renewed series of squeals, and Mrs. Hudson, and Mrs. Bo-gardus, and Ernie, and the pitcher, and the silver tray, all came crashing and bumping down together in one ignominious tangle.

Mother, and Mrs. Hancock, and Rose came running from various parts of the house. In a moment there was quite a crowd gathered.

First Mrs. Hudson was picked up, spluttering and bewildered; next we rescued Mrs. Bo-gardus; then Ernie, who still clung desperately to her half-empty pitcher. All dignity, all sense of social circumstance, had vanished. The members of the dripping little group glared upon one another, humanly, democratically mad.

“Here,” said Ernestine, thrusting out the pitcher resentfully to Mrs. Hudson, “I guess this belongs to you.”

“This” was the ceremonial blond front, which had somehow come unpinned in the mÊlÉe, and was now floating mermaid-wise in a few inches of ice-water at the bottom of the pitcher.

Mrs. Hudson sniffed, fished out her crimps, and flapped them scornfully.

“I leave this house to-morrow,” she remarked. “Children are all very well in their place!”

“It wasn’t my place,” contradicted Ernie, wrathfully. “I slipped on the top step and tobogganed!”

“Ernestine!” rebuked mother. “I trust you are not hurt,” she continued, turning to Mrs. Bo-gardus, who stood beside the newel-post, ruefully rubbing an elbow.

“Not being a Christian Scientist, nor yet a gutta-percha image, I confess to a few bruises,” returned that lady, spitefully; after which she and Mrs. Hudson swept on their way upstairs, leaving us at gaze.

“As if I meant to,” brooded Ernestine. “I’m not a Christian Scientist, myself. Why couldn’t they get out of the way, I’d like to know? and—who’s Mrs. Bogardus, anyhow?”

For the first time the question was presented to us squarely. We gaped at one another, like so many goldfish.

“That is so,” admitted Miss Brown in a timid voice, after a moment of deep thought. “Who is she?”

“And it couldn’t have been a rubber-plant,” chirped Bobsie with sudden easy confidence, “because then there wouldn’t be any rhyme.”

“It was a hired hansom she came in,” observed Mrs. Hancock, cheerfully. “And did you notice that she ate three of those fried croquettes for lunch? Her stummick can’t be so very sensitive, after all! I shall have to tell my husband!”

Certainly, Ernestine’s pitcher of ice-water had had a wonderfully quenching effect! But Mrs. Hudson is going, and, as I said, we can’t afford it.

“I was only trying to help,” murmurs Ernie, mournfully pulling off one of her long stockings, as she sits on the floor in the middle of our little room. “Do stop writing, Elizabeth, and come to bed. There is a smudge of ink on the tip of your nose where you dipped it in the bottle, and I just know you are saying it is all my fault!”

Dear little Ernie, how did she ever guess?