How much you bane pay?"

"Of course! How stupid of me! What do you ask?"

"I ask twelve dollar a week for cuking and ten dollar a week for
claneuping but I bane get less than I ask. If I do cuking and
claneuping both together I ask fifteen dollar a week but I bane come to
you and see how you suit me for twelve. I bane a bum at telegraphing."

"You mean telephoning?"

"Yah, telephoning, but I bane willing to learn. Have you bane keeping
other help?"

"I try to but they have all left me lately. Would you work with colored
people?"

"You bane meaning blacks? I do not love them but if you try me you find
I do twice three time as much work as blacks."

"And your name?"

"Miss Josie Larson!"

"All right, Miss Josie Larson, suppose you come in the morning and go
to work."

"I bane come tomorrow night and cuke the dinner. I got other business
on hand for morning."

"Well, I'm sorry, but I fancy I can get along without you for twelve
hours longer. Now, mind you, come in time. I have dinner at seven."

"I bane coming at five. Do you to market go yourself?"

"I'll have provisions in the house ready for you. After tomorrow you
will have to do the housekeeping as well as cooking. If I have a friend
in to dinner could you serve two of us?"

"Sure! I bane smart enough to serve eight if you have knives and forks
to go round."

Josie made a stiff bow and backed awkwardly down the steps. When the
door was closed she turned quickly and literally ran back to the
Elberta Inn. She got safely to her room without being seen by any of
the aristocratic boarders.

Alice Chisholm was waiting for her.

"Well, how about it?"

"Got my job as chief cook and bottle washer with the handsome Chester
Hunt and will cook dinner for him tomorrow evening. In the meantime I
have some work ahead of me. What I would have done without you, Alice,
I do not see. I should have been forced to double-cross my boss, and
I'd have hated it. My father always preached being faithful in small
things."

The next day was a busy one for Josie as well as Alice Chisholm. Josie
must lay in a supply of maid's uniforms, aprons and caps. She must
write letters to Mary Louise and her partners of the Higgledy-Piggledy,
also a business epistle to her boss of the household necessities and
jeweled novelties. A cook book must be purchased of the latest and most
approved recipes, Josie having mastered only a few of the simpler
dishes, but she had always declared