"Miss Morgan is such a dear girl, isn't she?" says Aunt Laura.
"Uh-huh," says I, pokin' in some frostin' that had lodged on the
outside.
"You are quite well acquainted with her, aren't you?" says she.
"Um-m-m-m," says I.
"Let's see," goes on Aunt Laura, "what is it she did at the office!"
"Chickety-click, ding-g-g!" says I, makin' motions with my fingers.
"Oh, typewriting!" says she. "But I suppose she was very skillful at
it?"
"Oh, she was a bird!" says I.
See what was happenin'? I was bein' pumped. It was more'n that too.
Everything I knew about Mildred, and a lot I guessed at, was emptied out
of me like she was usin' one of these vacuum cleaners on my head. When I
gets to telling about the place out West where Mildred lived before she
and her maw hit New York, Aunt Laura jumps up.
"Oh, I know some people who lived there once," says she. "I wonder if
any of them knew Miss Morgan?"
With that she picks up the desk 'phone and gives a call. Did they know
any Miss Morgans out there? Yes, Mildred Morgan. Really! A brother too?
How interesting! Who was he, and what was he doing last? What! In the
State penitentiary! That was enough for Aunt Laura. She hangs up the
receiver and says to me:
"Boy, when you get back to the office tell Mr. Robert I want to see him.
Come, you'd better be going now."
It was a case of "Here's your hat--what's your hurry!"
"Say," says I, "don't you go to swallowin' any tale about the Lady
Mildred havin' a brother that's a crook. There's lots of Morgans besides
her and J. P."
But all Aunt Laura does is hold the door open for me; so I beats it,
feelin' about as chipper as though I'd been turnin' State's evidence.
The more I thinks of it, the cheaper I feels. Here I'd been playin'
myself for Mr. Foxy Cute, and had let an old lemon squeezer like Aunt
Laura wring me dry!
Just what she's got up her sleeve about the penitentiary business, I
didn't know; but I wa'n't long in findin' out. Next day there was all
kinds of a row. Aunt Laura has looked up the invitation list for the
weddin', and, sure enough, among the also rans was a Mr. William Morgan,
with a State penitentiary address. With that, and what she'd heard over
the 'phone, Aunt Laura makes out a strong case. Was she goin' to stand
by and see her only nephew marry into a family of jailbirds? Not if she
could help it! So she calls in Mr. Robert and puts the layout before
him.
It looks like a bad mess, with Mildred on the toboggan; for Mr. Robert
has said he'd see what could be done. He don't promise anything; but
Benny's always been such a willin' performer that he guesses maybe he
can talk him out of wantin' to get married. He didn't know Benny,
though. These short, fat, dimpled boys are just the ones to fool you,
and when it came to tellin' Benny about Brother Bill, that was doin'
time, Benny works his lips at high speed sayin' that he don't believe
it.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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