Democratic Sentinel, Volume 8, Number 18, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 May 1884 — KITTY'S COOKING EXPERIMENT. [ARTICLE]

KITTY'S COOKING EXPERIMENT.

BY M. C. FARLEY.

The band was playing the “Beautiful Slue Danube,” but John was too angry i4e care for the musio. He hurried his •pretty fiance into the conservatory, and hidden behind a tall palm whispered fiercely in her ear, “You promised me that you wouldn’t dance again with that Fitz Simmonds, and I’ve counted three waltzes, besides a polka or two. What does this* mean, Kitty?” “I think it means that you’re inclined to find fault with me, John, and to be jealous.” Kitty smiled saucily up into her companion's angry face. “But your promise, Kitty: what of that?” “To be sure, John, I told you I would not waltz again with Fitz Simmonds. But you know promises are like pie-crusts—made to be broken, and I couldn’t help it. Fitz dances divinely. ” ■“Fitz Simmonds is a cowardly sneak,” •burst out young Mason, in quick passion. “And I forbid you to dance with him again." “You forbid me,” repeated Kitty with withering emphasis and a proud toss of her head. “Yfes. I forbid you,” retorted John in a sudden heat. “I will not permit any wife to go dancing around any ball, room with Fitz Simmond’s arms about her waist.” A dangerous flash shot from Mis Kitty’s eyes. “In the first place, Mr. Mason, you mre ridiculously jealous. And in the ■second plaoe permit me to return your ring, and to inform you that so far as I can help it you will never have a wife to dance around a ball-room with anybody.” John ground the tiny ring under his beel. “Now, Kitty, ” But there was no Kitty. She had disappeared like a flash among the throng at the open door. And ten minutes later he saw her handed to the carriage by his hated rival. If John Mason retired to his couch that night, or rather that morning—; for the hour was long enough past mid-* night—in no enviable frame of mind, what must have been Kitty’s feelings mb she sought the privacy of her own woom, and meditated npon the downfall -of all her former hopes. Two stray tears trickled down her dear little nose -as she put up her crimps before the iglass and caught a glimpse of the ringdess forefinger whereon John’s diamond liad so long had an abiding place. “As if anybody could care two straws for Fitz Simmonds, the silly thing,” said Kitty, crossly, getting into bed. “And -John—oh! dear me. No girl in the world ever had so much trouble as I.” Long enoughibefore Kitty’s blue eyes opened John Mason had packed his value and announced to his mother that lie intended to go ont into the country and spend the summer Mi one of his places down the river, and that on no account was she to send him any messages, invitations, -or anything else. He declared savagely that he hated the world. “All he •eked now was to be let alone,” and -away he went. it was six weeks after John Mason’s Issrira that the great bank failure ocoorred in Smithvillcv Kitty went down 4» dinner one dajr attd was greeted with

the astonishing news of the failure, coupled with the intelligence that all the McCord money was snnk in the general disaster, and that now the bank had 1 ursted the McCords—meaning the widow and her fonr daughters —hadn’t a penny with which to bless themselves. “What on earth is to be done,” gasped Kitty, pale with astonishment and terror. “Here’s Nell and Bess and little Flo, all younger than I am, and there isn’t a thing we can do to earn monev.” “Do!” ejaculated Mrs. McCord, "we can all starve I suppose. We can all starve in a heap together.” “What a pity that you can’t teach music, K tty,” said Flo, disconsolately. “Or if you could only have a class in drawing,” added Bess. “Or that mamma were only a firstrate dressmaker,” put in Nell. Mrs. McCord lifted up her hands in horror. “No McCord ever yet descended to menial labor,” said she, loftily. “4f Kitty hadn't such a temper she would long since have been well married and s ttled, and in such a crisis as this she would have then been able to offer a home to her afflicted family.” Kitty, mind yon, was barely 19. Kitty bit her lip. “I know what I can do, girls,” said she, laughing. “Do you remember the lessons I took at Miss Parloe’s cooking club? Well, I can cook—even mamma has to admit that.” “I shall wr te to your Unole Potipher and ask him for assistance,” said Mrs. McCord, loftily. “Uncle Pot! Oh, dear me!” ejaculated the four girls in chorus. “He’s too awfully stingy for anything!” ‘'He’ll only send yon some tracts and a lot of advice,” said Nell. Kitty said nothing, but going to the library she looked over a file of the daily papers. “Uncle Pot,” muttered she, running over a list of late advertisements. “I’d rather be dead than live with that hateful old thing., We would be obliged to eat bread and water and be told ten times a day how much it cost him to keep ns. Mamma may go to Uncle Potipher if she likes and take the girls along; but, as for me, I’d rather work.” She paused at one of the late advertisements that happened to catch her eye, and read it over twice:

Wanted —A Cook —In a gentloman’s family, where there Is neither company nor children, a strictly first-class cook is required, 'ion dollars per week paid to satisfactory party. Apply at once, by letter, to P. O. Box 10, Brier Lodire, Thorn field.” Kitty read it once again. “No children and no company! I think it would be just the thing for me,” thought she. “Anyway, I’m going to try it.” Miss McCord did not wait to hear from Uncle Potipher. Upon second consideration, she decided it would be as well to go and make him a visit, and then apprise him of her loss of fortune. “By which time,” said Kitty, calmly, “I will be settled into some kind of btusiness or other, and Uncle Pot will take the thing more kindly. He won’t he so apt to feel as if we had taken him by storm, and intended to stop with im bougre malgre." “I hate French, Kitty. Besides, it is bad taste to interlard your sentences with foreign quotations,” said her mamma. “And I shall leave you in charge of the house, though I want you to remember that you are a McCord, and I expect you to behave yourself accordingly. Don’t do anything to disgrace the family. Perhaps your Uncle Potipher will offer us a home with him, and so put our present difficulties to flight for a wliile, anyway. ” Kitty’s “tip-tilted” nose tilted a trifle higher at the idea of Uncle Potipher offering them a home, but she made no reply, and helped with the packing, glad when at last they were off. Kitty had written to “Box 10, Brier Lodge.” She didn’t much like the idea of doing menial duties, but just now there was nothing else she was qualified for. To be sure, she could play a little, and sing a little, and, like all other fashionable young ladies of her set, she had some skill at drawing. But to tell the whole naked, unlovely truth, her knowledge of these branches was much too defective for her to attempt to teach any one of them. Besides, Kitty detested teaching in any shape. Only in one thing had she become proficient, and that one thing was the unfashionable art of cooking. Miss Parloe never had a more apt or more interested pupil than Kitty, who had entered at once into the respective merits of soups and roasts, and puddings and pies, with a zest that betrayed an appreciative spirit. A letter came that day from Brier Lodge. Kitty had given Miss Parloe herself as her reference, but it seemed as if this had been unnecessary. The reply to the application had evidently been written by the housekeeper, who urged Miss McCord to come on at onee. When Kitty read this letter a feeling of dismay came over her. She looked at her dimpled white hands. “And so I am really to be cook in a gentleman’s family,” said she, ruefully. “But then there is the $lO a week—only think of $lO a week to one in my circumstances. Besides, it makes me impendent, and free from Uncle Potipuer, and if I were a private governess, or a school ma’am, my salary would be no h'gher. But tell it not—-oh! tell it not in Gath, that the proud Kitty MoCord has gone to be a cook.” To the friends who affectionately tried to worm Kitty’s future destination from her, she tnrned a polite though deaf ear. She was going into the country for the summer, she said, and it was uncertain when she would return. Perhaps not unt 1 mamma and the girls returned from Uncle Potipher’s, and perhaps not then. She really could not tell herself. Under the circumstances, she preferred to keep her whereabouts te herself and her family—until their financial affairs were straightened ont and fully settled. She packed her trunk with some plain clothing—gingham and calico dresses —and early one morning slipped down to t*e station. .. . Late, in the afternoon the train stopped at Brier ville, and a big hulkj in£ fellow, With his pants in his bootj tops, stepped up to her, and asked her :if she was the new cook for River

Lodge—in anwser to her question as to the distance and direction of that desired haven. With a quaking heart, Kitty climbed into the democrat wagon. “Really this is horrible,” thought Bhe, as the hired man took a seat beside her and calmly explained the merits of the team, and finally asked her, after some skirting round the corners, if she “had a steady feller? an’ if she hadn’t, why she might count on him for a regul r Sunday night business, if she’d only say the word. ” However, they were not long in arriving at their destination, and without more ado the new cook was installed in her new domain. The first thing to be done was to prepare the snpper. Kitty thought Miss Parloe was a failure when the faultfinding lord of the Lodge returned the eggs for the fourth time lzefore he would condescend to eat them. “I’m glad I wasn’t born a man,” said Kitty, as, flushed and tired, she gave the obnoxious eggs the fourth twist at the blaze and sent them back again by the waiter. “Those eggs in the beginning were cooked a la Parloe to a turn. It is worth ten dollars a week to serve such a fault-finding master as this one is.”

The next morning her trials began in good earnest. The master of Brier Lpd re was not only fastidious, but capricious as well, and Kitty soon discovered that she was not only expected to cook the meals, but to wash the dishes and blacken his boots beside. “I’ll die before I’ll touch those odious boots,” said she, rebelliously. “And I’ll report you to the master if yon don’t,” said the old housekeeper. Ten dollars aweek,or Uncle Potipher! The thought came like a flash into Kitty’s mind, and Bhe picked up the boots. It was something she had never done in her life before, apd, moreover, in this particular art, she had received no lessons from so distinguished a teacher as Miss Parloe. It was no wonder the horrid boots did not reflect to her credit. She put them down in disgust. Tears came into her eyes. The coffee boiled over, the ham was burning, and the muffins, that had promised so well in the beginning, were browned to a crust. Kitty burst into tears. In the midst of her distress the housekeeper came into the kitchen with an order from the master to the cook. Cook was wanted in the dining-room. Kitty marched up-stairs much against her will and entered the presence of her employer, who sat with his back to the door.

“I’ll tell yon what it is, cook,” cried out this personage in a strangely familiar voice, as she walked toward the table, “I have a friend coming to dine with me to-day, and there must be game for dinner.” Kitty was staring hard at the speaker. She remembered that voice only too well; and here she was, with a kitchen apron on, and a smudge of coal dust staining her right cheek—cooking his meals, washing his dishes, and, yes —blackening his very boots. Oh, dear! She was on the point of running out oi the room, when the gentleman, surprised at her silence, turned himself about and stood face to face with his new cook. “Kitty McCord!” ejaculated he in genuine amazement. “Oh, John!” gasped Kitty, ready to sink with mortification. Mr. Mason didn’t stand on ceremony. Two long arms swung themselves about Kitty’s waist, and a kiss alighted on the little smudgy cheek. “Oh, you heavenly girl,” cried John ecstaticly. “You’ve came to make up, have’nt you ?” Kitty remembered her position. She pulled herself away. “I came to cook, ” said she, simply. “To cook?” “You see we’ve lost all onr money. Mamma and the girls have gone to Uncle Potipher’s, and I—I—” “And I’ve been buried up alive in this out-of-the-way place for the last two months, and never heard a wold of it,” groaned John. “Of course I had to earn money, and none of my other accomplishments being available, I thought I would try cooking. Your housekeeper advertised for a cook, and so I came. I did not know Brier Lodge belonged to you, though—” “Brier Lodge is a recent investment—”

“And I resign the situation at once,” added Kitty, composedly. “Now, Kitty,” began John, earnestly, be serious. I can’t live without you any longer. Let ns make up once more. I’ve got another ring that will just tit you, and it’s right here in my pocket this minute, ready for business. 1 won’t be jealous again. Try me and see.” “And Fitz Simmonds?" “Just wear this ring of mine again, and name an early day for our marriage, and you may dance with Fitz Simmonds until he drops. Now then.” Kitty burst out laughing. “Oh, John! How do I look in a kitchen apron ?”asked she, irrelevantly. “You are adorable in anything,” asserted Mason, keeping a tight grip on her. “But that isn’t the question, will you marry me—quick now.” “Mr. Mason,Esquire,"cried she, dropping a courtesy; “dear sir, I will. How does that suit you ?” “That suits me perfectly.” Miss McCord returned to town that very day, and a few weeks later there was a quiet wedding that made her Mrs. John Mason and put an end forever to her flirting possibilities, though there is every reason in the world for believing that at the same time it opened a vast and never ending sphere for unlimited experiments in cooking. Bass was terribly angry when he found himself referred to in the local paper as a “prig.” He appealed to his acquaintances if there was anything of the prig about him; and the universal verdict rendered was that there was not. Indeed, the editor of the paper, who happened along at the moment, also admitted it. “Then why in thunder do yon call me one ?” roared Bass. “Calm yourself, my dear fellow,” said the editor. “It wsb all owing to the compositor, who put an *r’ between the ‘p’ and the ‘L’” Bass went off in orthographic study.— Exchanae. /