Of course I couldn't buy any for the same reasons as
yesterday. So they sprung a working girls War Crippled Aid Fund and I
contributed to that, because I believe in girls running elevators. Why
wouldn't they, when thousands has run dumb-waiters so good for years?
Well, anyways, I give them something and escaped to the street only to
be lit on for stamps by the first small boy I met. And after only seven
others had tried me, I got to the Palatial Hotel, and--believe you
me--by that time worried pretty severely about how could a person sell
twenty-five thousand dollars worth of the pesky things and not get slain
by some impatient citizen who felt that I was the last camel and his
back was broke, or whatever the poet says? Really, it was serious, and
being the first of the Theatrical Ladies to arrive, the big ballroom
with the table and seven empty chairs like a desert island in the middle
of the floor, failed to cheer me any.

Well, there was a arm-chair at one end of the table and there being
nobody around to either elect me or stop me, I grabbed off this chair
and held to it with the grim expression of a suburbanite who knows her
husband isn't coming but wont admit it, and a good thing I acted prompt
as should be done in all war-measures, because pretty soon the other
ladies commenced arriving. I guess they must of thought they could get a
better part by coming early, they was so prompt, and by one o'clock they
was actually all there except Pattie and her unknown friend, which was
pretty good, the date having been twelve-thirty.

Well, we all shook hands and I arose from my seat but didn't move a inch
away from it, having seen something of committee meetings where the
wrong person had it. And then they all sat down and took in my dress and
hat and I theirs, and we was very amiable and refined and I felt so glad
I had picked such a good bunch and wished Pattie would hurry so's we
could commence, when lo! as the poet says, my wish was granted, for in
come Pattie and with her her friend and My Gawd, if it wasn't Ruby
Roselle!

Well, far be it from me to say anything about any lady, only pro-Germans
is pro-Germans by any other name, as Shakespeare says, provided you can
find it out, and here she was, butting in on a gathering of would-be
Dolly Madisons and Moll Pritchers and everything, and I wouldn't of
invited her for the world if only Pattie had mentioned her name. But
here she was, all dressed up like a plush horse an