tructions
for boiling turnips, and her face cleared. "If it helps to cut turnips
thin, why not potatoes?" she cried. "I _can_ do that, anyhow; and I
will," she finished, with a sigh of relief, as she caught up half a
dozen potatoes and hurried into the pantry for a knife. A few minutes
later, the potatoes, peeled, and cut almost to wafer thinness, were
dumped into a basin of cold water.

"There! now I guess you'll cook," nodded Billy to the dish in her hand
as she hurried to the stove.

Chilled by an ominous unresponsiveness, Billy lifted the stove lid and
peered inside. Only a mass of black and graying coals greeted her. The
fire was out.

"To think that even you had to go back on me like this!" upbraided
Billy, eyeing the dismal mass with reproachful gaze.

This disaster, however, as Billy knew, was not so great as it seemed,
for there was still the gas stove. In the old days, under Dong Ling's
rule, there had been no gas stove. Dong Ling disapproved of "devil
stoves" that had "no coalee, no woodee, but burned like hellee." Eliza,
however, did approve of them; and not long after her arrival, a fine one
had been put in for her use. So now Billy soon had her potatoes with a
brisk blaze under them.

In frantic earnest, then, Billy went to work. Brushing the discarded
onions, turnip, and beets into a pail under the table, she was still
confronted with the beefsteak, lettuce, and grapefruit. All but the
beefsteak she pushed to one side with gentle pats.

"You're all right," she nodded to them. "I can use you. You don't have
to be cooked, bless your hearts! But _you_--!" Billy scowled at
the beefsteak and ran her finger down the index of the "Bride's
Helper"--Billy knew how to handle that book now.

"No, you don't--not for me!" she muttered, after a minute, shaking her
finger at the tenderloin on the table. "I haven't got any 'hot coals,'
and I thought a 'gridiron' was where they played football; though it
seems it's some sort of a dish to cook you in, here--but I shouldn't
know it from a teaspoon, probably, if I should see it. No, sir! It's
back to the refrigerator for you, and a nice cold sensible roast leg of
lamb for me, that doesn't have to be cooked. Understand? _Cooked_," she
finished, as she carried the beefsteak away and took possession of the
hitherto despised cold lamb.

Once more Billy made a mad search through cupboards and shelves. This
time she bore back in triumph a can of corn, another of tomatoes