第23章

AUNT HANNAH SPEAKS HER MIND

Bertram said that the Strata was not a strata any longer. He declared that between them, Billy and Spunk had caused such an upheaval that there was no telling where one stratum left off and another began. What Billy had not attended to, Spunk had, he said.

"You see, it's like this," he explained to an amused friend one day. "Billy is taking piano lessons of Cyril, and she is posing for one of my heads. Naturally, then, such feminine belongings as fancy-work, thread, thimbles, and hairpins are due to show up at any time either in Cyril's apartments or mine--to say nothing of William's; and she's in William's lots--to look for Spunk, if for no other purpose.

"You must know that Spunk likes William's floor the best of the bunch, there are so many delightful things to play with. Not that Spunk stays there--dear me, no. He's a sociable little chap, and his usual course is to pounce on a shelf, knock off some object that tickles his fancy, then lug it in his mouth to--well, anywhere that he happens to feel like going. Cyril has found him up-stairs with a small miniature, battered and chewed almost beyond recognition. And Aunt Hannah nearly had a fit one day when he appeared in her room with an enormous hard-shelled black bug--dead, of course--that he had fished from a case that Pete had left open.

As for me, I can swear that the little round white stone he was playing with in my part of the house was one of William's Collection Number One.

"And that isn't all," Bertram continued. "Billy brings her music down to show to me, and lugs my heads all over the rest of the house to show to other folks. And there is always everywhere a knit shawl, for Aunt Hannah is sure to feel a draught, and Billy keeps shawls handy. So there you are! We certainly aren't a strata any longer," he finished.

Billy was, indeed, very much at home in the Beacon Street house--too much so, Aunt Hannah thought. Aunt Hannah was, in fact, seriously disturbed. To William one evening, late in May, she spoke her mind.

"William, what are you going to do with Billy?" she asked abruptly.

"Do with her? What do you mean?" returned William with the contented smile that was so often on his lips these days. "This is Billy's home.""That's the worst of it," sighed the woman, with a shake of her head.