Honest, I can enjoy an Auntie who does her droppin' in by 'phone. I almost got so fond of her that I was on the point of suggestin' to Vee that she tell Auntie to reverse the charges. No, I didn't quite go that far. I'd hate to have her think I was gettin' slushy or sentimental. But it sure was comfortin', when I came home after a busy day at the Corrugated Trust, to reflect that Auntie was settled nice and cozy on the ninth floor about twenty-five miles due west from us. I should have knocked on wood, though. Uh-huh. Or kept my fingers crossed, or something. For here the other night, as I strolls up from the station I spots an express truck movin' on ahead in the general direction of our house. I felt kind of a sinkin' sensation the minute I saw that truck. I can't say why. Psychic, I expect. You know. Ouija stuff. And sure enough, the blamed truck turns into our driveway. By the time I arrives the man has just unloaded two wardrobe trunks and a hat box. And in the livin' room I finds Auntie. "Eh?" says I, starin'. "Why, I--I thought you was----" "How cordial!" says Auntie. "Yes," says I, catchin' my breath quick. "Isn't it perfectly bully that you could come? We was afraid you'd be havin' such a good time in town that we couldn't----" "And so I was, until last night," says Auntie. "Verona, will tell you all about it, I've no doubt." Oh yes, Vee does. She unloads it durin' a little stroll we took out towards the garden. New York hadn't been behavin' well towards Auntie. Not at all well. Just got on one of its cantankerous streaks. First off there was a waiters' strike on the roof-garden restaurant where most of the tenants took their dinners. It happened between soup and fish. In fact, the fish never got there at all. Nor the roast, nor the rest of the meal. And the head waiter and the house manager had a rough-and-tumble scrap right in plain sight of everybody and some perfectly awful language was used. Also the striking waiters marched out in a body and shouted things at the manager as they went. So Auntie had to put on her things and call a taxi and drive eight blocks before she could finish her dinner. Then about 9 o'clock, as she was settling down for a quiet evening in her rooms, New York pulled another playful little stunt on her. Nothing unusual. A leaky gas main and a poorly insulated electric light cable made connection with the well-known results. For half a mile up and down the avenue that Auntie's apartment faced on the manhole covers were blown off. They go off with a roar and a bang, you know. One of 'em sailed neatly up within ten feet of Auntie's back hair, crashed through the window of the apartment just above her and landed on the floor so impetuous that about a yard of plaster came rattlin' down on Auntie's head. Some fell in her lap and some went down the back of her neck.