"If you are going--" She was speaking calmly.

"Going where?" I replied, picking up the seed catalogues to make room
for myself on the couch. "_Please_ look at this pumpkin! Think of
what a jack-o'-lantern it would make for the boys! I am going to
plant--"

"You 'll be cold," she said, rising and drawing a steamer rug up over
me; then laying the open magazine across my shoulders while giving the
pillow a motherly pull, she added, with a sigh of contentment:--

"Perhaps, if it had n't been for me, you might have been a great
success with pumpkins or pigs--I don't know."




[Illustration: The Dustless-Duster]

V

THE DUSTLESS-DUSTER

There are beaters, brooms and Bissell's Sweepers; there are dry-mops,
turkey-wings, whisks, and vacuum-cleaners; there are--but no matter.
Whatever other things there are, and however many of them in the
closet, the whole dust-raising kit is incomplete without the
Dustless-Duster.