Families -- Fiction; Humorous stories; Man-woman relationships -- Fiction; New York (N.Y.) -- Fiction; Older people -- Fiction
[Illustration: “The carriage stopped three hundred feet below the
level of a roof-garden.”]
“Nothing’s the trouble,” said Jack, “everything’s fine and dandy. We’re
going out now. Time of your life, Aunt Mary, time of your life!”
They telephoned for a carriage and all got in. Then Clover slammed the
door.
“Now see what you’ve done!” said the parrot.
“Is he going to keep saying that?” Burnett asked.
“I don’t know,” said Jack. “It comes in pretty pat, don’t it?”
“Makes me think of my mother,” said Clover. “I wish it wouldn’t.”
“I don’t catch who’s sayin’ what,” said Aunt Mary.
“Nobody’s saying anything, Miss Watkins,” roared Mitchell; “we are all
talking airy nothings just to pass the time o’ day.”
The carriage stopped three hundred feet below the level of a roof
garden.
“We get out here,” said Burnett.
They all got out and went up in an elevator.
“Seems to be a good many goin’ to the same place,” said Aunt Mary.
“Yes,” said Mitchell, “a good many people generally go to places that
are great places for a good many people to go to.”
“You ought not to end with a preposition,” said Clover.
“There, I left my ear-trumpet in the carriage!” said Aunt Mary.
There was a pause of consternation. No one spoke except the parrot.
“We know what she’s done without your telling us,” said Clover,
addressing the bird. “The question is what to do next?”
Jack went back downstairs and found the carriage waiting in hopes of
picking up another load. He lost no time in personally picking up the
ear-trumpet and returning to his friends.
Then they all proceeded above and bought a table and turned their
chairs to the stage, where the attraction just at that moment was a
quartette of pretty girls.
“I’ll tell you what we’ll do,” said Burnett the instant the girls began
to sing. “Let’s each tie a card to a mouse and present them to the
girls!”
The suggestion found favor and was followed out to the letter. But when
the girls were through and the Chinaman who followed them on the
programme was also over, the pleasures of life in that spot palled upon
the party.
“Oh, come,” said Burnett, “let’s go somewhere else. Let’s go out in the
air.”
His suggestion found favor. And they sallied forth and visited another
roof garden, a theater where they saw the last quarter of the fourth
act, a place where Aunt Mary was given a gondola ride, and a place
where she was given something in the shape of light refreshments.
Then, becoming thirsty, they ordered a few White Horses and Red Horses
and the Necks of yet other horses, but Aunt Mary declined the horses of
all colors and Mitchell upheld her.
“That’s right,” he said, “I’m a great believer in knowing when you’ve
had enough, and I’m sure you’ve all had so much too much that I know
that I must have had enough and that she’s better off with none at
all.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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