had
been tightly coiled around her head. She parted her hair in the middle
and then pulled it tightly back in a hard knot, carefully disclosing
her ears, something no person of any breeding was supposed to do at
that time. The knot was placed at exactly the wrong angle, giving a
strangely comic look to her profile. The georgette dinner dress was
discarded for the tweed suit but the suit was so put on that all
semblance of natty cut was lost. The skirt was on slightly askew and
pulled up in front and down in the back. The belt to the Norfolk jacket
was drawn too tight and the effect was blousy from the rear and what
Alice called "a poor white folk's tuck" in the fore. Josie's sailor hat
she placed on the back of her head, carefully pulling it down so that
one ear was pushed down by the crown. The despised rouge was wiped from
her cheeks and artistically applied to her nose--not much, but just a
suspicion.

"Splendid! Splendid!" cried Alice. "I don't believe you will need a
reference. You would have to be honest to look like that."

The reference was written, however, and signed A. Chisholm. With it
tightly clasped in a hand upon which Josie had drawn a large white
cotton glove, a finishing touch to her costume, the would-be housemaid
silently crept from the Elberta Inn and, with an extra dull look in her
eyes, rang the front door bell at the Waller house.

CHAPTER XII
CHESTER HUNT'S NEW MAID

"Nobody home!" was Josie's disappointed verdict after she had waited a
few minutes and there was no response to her ring. She rang again, this
time with sharp decision. She heard the opening of a door upstairs and
then the lower hall was flooded with light and a sound of quick, light
footsteps on the stairs and the front door was jerked open somewhat
impatiently. Josie looked stolidly into the handsome countenance of
Chester Hunt.

"Well, what is it?" he asked brusquely, taking in with some amusement
the awkward little figure before him.

"I bane come to work for you."

"Oh! In answer to my ad?"

"Sure!"

"What can you do?"

"Anything with my hands but I bane not much good on head work."

"Can you clean a house and serve a meal?"

"Yah!"

"Perhaps you can cook too!"

"I can cuke some."

"What nationality are you?"

"I bane Luther."

"German?" smiling.

"Naw! I bane Swede," and Josie permitted an expression of disgust to
flit over her otherwise blank countenance.

"Well, when can you go to work?"

"