in' out of his
big, tall body was as unexpected as a hymn tune in a cent-in-the-slot
talkin' machine.

"'Too bad,' he says. 'As a waiter, I'm afraid--'

"Just then the door of one of the Annex houses opened sudden, and there
stood Grace Robinson. The light behind her showed her up plain as could
be. I heard Fred Bearse make a kind of gaspin' noise in his throat.

"'What a lovely night!' she says, half to herself. Then she calls:
'Papa, dear, you really ought to see the stars.'

"Old man Robinson, who I judged was in the settin' room, snarled out
somethin' which wa'n't no compliment to the stars. Then he ordered
her to come in afore she catched cold. She sighed and obeyed orders,
shuttin' the door astern of her. Next thing I knew that literary tenor
grabbed my arm--'twa'n't no canary-bird grip, neither.

"'Who was that?' he whispers, eager.

"I told him. 'That's the name they give,' says I, 'but we have doubts
about its bein' the real one. You see, there's some mystery about them
Robinsons, and--'

"'I'll take that waiter's place,' he says, quick. 'Shall I go right in
and begin now? Don't stop to argue, man; I say I'll take it.'

"And he did take it by main strength, pretty nigh. Every time I'd open
my mouth he'd shut it up, and at last I give in, and showed him where he
could sleep.

"'You turn out at five sharp,' I told him. 'And you needn't bother to
write no poems while you're dressin', neither.'

"'Good night,' he answers, brisk. 'Go, will you, please? I want to
think.'

"I went. 'Tain't until an hour later that I remembered he hadn't asked
one word concernin' the wages. And next mornin' he comes to me and
suggests that perhaps 'twould be as well if I didn't tell his real name.
He was pretty sure he'd been away schoolin' so long that he wouldn't be
recognized. 'And incognitos seem to be fashionable here,' he purrs, soft
and gentle.

"I wouldn't know an incognito if I stepped on one, but the tenor voice
of him kind of made me sick.

"'All right,' I snaps, sarcastic. 'Suppose I call you "Willie." How'll
that do?'

"'Do as well as anything, I guess,' he says. Didn't make no odds to him.
If I'd have called him 'Maud,' he'd have been satisfied.

"He waited in Annex Number Two, which was skippered by Cap'n Jonadab.
And, for a poet, he done pretty well, so the Cap'n said.

"'But say, Barzilla,' asks Jonadab, 'does that Willie thing know the
Robinsons?'

"'Guess not,' I says. But, thinkin' of the way