[Illustration: "I must warn the Kitchen People."]
"Ha, ha!" laughed Brother, and Mary Frances, somehow, couldn't explain about the Kitchen Folks.
Instead, "When does Aunt Maria come?" she asked. "Does she come to-night?"
"She's coming right over," answered her brother.
"Oh, oh!" thought Mary Frances, "I must warn the Kitchen People."
"Brother," she began, nervously, "you stay with Mother--I want to take these things down."
But Brother was already sitting quietly near Mother, and Mary Frances hurried softly downstairs.
"The poor dears! The poor dears!" she kept whispering all the way down.
[Illustration: "Milk Toast! the only think I could eat! why--who made it?"]
TO the kitchen door she ran, and was about to rush out, when she thought she heard voices--thin, little voices they were--so she peeped out, for the door was ajar,--and this is what she saw:
Toaster Man, all tired out, was leaning back in a chair, snoring softly; but all the other Kitchen People were wide awake. It was Tea Kettle that was speaking:
"So, he put the eight feathers in a pan, and cooked them----"
"The Jack Rabbit--and then he ate their fringe all off, and gave the bones to the cat. Then he bragged--he bragged that he'd eaten eight whole chickens at once."
"Humph!" said Sauce Pan. "Was that his recipe for Fried Chicken?"
[Illustration: Toaster Man all tired out.]
[Illustration: "A Little Cap and Apron!" cried Mary Frances.]
"My, I'd love to hear more about the Jack Rabbit," thought Mary Frances, "but I must warn them about Aunt Maria"; and she hurried out into the kitchen.
"Listen!" she whispered, with upraised finger. "Listen!--Mother is going away, and Aunt Maria's coming over to keep house. Don't ever say a word--she'll never understand you, and she'll scrub and scour you till you ache, poor things!--she'll do that anyway, but don't talk before her. I hurried down to warn you--I was so afraid you might."
"Never fear," spoke up Tea Kettle; "we never, never talk before 'grown-ups'--we can't help them. I forgot to tell you--if you speak about us to anyone, we can never, never speak again."
"Oh," said Mary Frances, "it's a secret! I'm so glad you told me--I came so near telling Mother about Toaster Man--I might have, only----"